The Justice and Profit of a Uniform Penny Postage. 451

ascertained; for as no inference can be drawn from the silence of contemporaries, so a legitimate reputation can not be founded upon their admiration and applause. Perhaps Coleridge himself has rightly solved the conditions of perpetual remembrance.

.. The truly Great

Have all one age, and from one visible space
Shed influence. They both in power and act
Are permanent, and Time is not with them
Save as it worketh for them, they in it."

ARTICLE V.

The Justice and Profit of a Uniform Penny Postage.

1. First, Second and Third Reports of the Select Committee on Postage. Ordered by the House of Commons to be printed 4th April, 1838. 1st and 13th August, 1838. 2. Report of the Postmaster-General of the United States of America. 1837.

3. Facts and Reasons for Mr. Hill's Penny Postage. By W. H. ASHURST. 8°. 1838.

4. Annuaire des Postes, ou Manuel du service de la Poste aux Lettres et aux Chevaux à l'usage du Public, publié par ordre de l'Administration. Paris, 1839.

5. Report of a Scene at Windsor Castle respecting the Uniform Penny Postage. 8°. 1839.

MUCH has been said of late, and as much written, in favour of the Uniform Penny Postage; and a healthy public feeling towards it, alike devoid of popular impulse as of political bias, has gradually sprung into existence, and continues to increase in strength*: still an implicit faith in the soundness of the

*The progress of public sympathy towards cheap postage deserves notice. During the Parliamentary Session which immediately followed the publication of Mr. Rowland Hill's pamphlet, five petitions were presented in favour of the plan of a penny postage. The example of petitioning, we believe, was set by several eminent firms of the Metropolis, and the first petition was signed by Messrs. Murray, Charles Knight, Longmans, and the principal London publishers. In the next Session, being that of 1837 and 1838, three hundred and twenty petitions were

measure has not been proclaimed; and the sober-minded, however much they may acknowledge its attractiveness, demur at its practicability. No settled conviction exists (and such a conviction must exist before the plan can be realized) that the principle of a uniform rate for all distances is just ; that the sum of one penny is enough to cover all the expenses incidental to the receipt, carriage and delivery of a letter; and that the adoption of this new plan would not ultimately sweep away that quantum of revenue now yielded by the Post-Office to the Exchequer. The recent publication of the verdict pronounced in favour of the measure by the Commons' Select

presented to the House of Commons alone, which the Report on Public Petitions enables us thus to class:

320

The postage petitions are nearly one-third more numerous than all the others praying for relief from taxation.

Postage..........

Repeal of corn laws

Number of petitions.

320

59

44

34

30

15

36

218

Marine insurances

Postage Committees have been formed, in the Metropolis by the zeal of Mr. George Moffatt,-in Edinburgh, Glasgow, Liverpool, Manchester, &c. to ascertain the amount of the contraband conveyance of letters; also how far the present postage rates suppress correspondence, and what would be the probable increase of letters under a Penny Post. The good service which the London Association, through the able agency of Mr. W. H. Ashurst, rendered to the Inquiries of the Select Committee of the House of Commons is acknowledged in its report. In a short time, without any public advertisement, seven hundred pounds were subscribed in London by the Rothschilds, Gledstanes, Morrisons, &c. to further this object. The whole press of the country, without exception, have gradually become the advocates of a Uniform Penny rate of Postage.

Committee calls for the clearing up of these doubts; which, notwithstanding the universal advocacy of the general plan put forth by the press, has, strange to say, hitherto remained imperfectly performed.

The proposal of Mr. Rowland Hill (no relation, by the by, to his namesake the celebrated preacher) is to substitute a uniform rate of one penny upon every half-ounce-weight, regardless of the distance which the letter may have to be carried; instead of the present ever-varying rates of postage, assessed on principles, a statement of which by the PostOffice authorities themselves, occupies at least fifty-eight octavo pages in the Post-Office Directory*.

In this article we shall adopt the conduct of a judge impar

* A few illustrations of the present rates of postage are worth producing. The last entry of the index to the postage-report gives an amusing example of the vagaries of postage charges. It stands thus-"ZEAL South and Honiton-a fourounce packet from Exeter to South Zeal, eighteen miles, would cost one penny; if sent to Honiton, sixteen miles, it would cost six shillings and eightpence." The inhabitants of Renfrew represented in a petition last Session, that if they posted "a three-ounce letter to go to Lochwinnock, fourteen miles distant, it would cost a penny; but if the same letter were addressed to Pollochshaws, half the distance, or seven miles, it would be charged four shillings." Different charges are made on letters of the same sort carried to the same place. This depends on the luck of the hour at which they are posted. Two Kingston-upon-Thames letters are lying before us-threepence postage was paid on the one and eightpence on the other; the difference of charge arising solely from the different hours at which they were posted. Croydon letters are treated in the same manner.

Two letters have been circulated generally to members of the legislature and others to illustrate another post-office principle of charge. One the size of the following:

DOUBLE LETTER

Under seven grains in weight.

A piece of paper weighing three and a half grains was inclosed in an envelope of this size, on which the following notice appeared: "Postage charges in 1838. This paper, four inches by two and a half inches, and its cover of similar size, weighs seven grains, or under the sixtieth part of an ounce weight, and is charged DOUBLE POSTAGE, whilst the accompanying sheet, thirty five inches by twentythree inches, weighing just one ounce, is charged as a single letter.-N. B. În France, Germany, and throughout Europe, postage is charged by weight." This Lilliputian letter was charged one shilling. A second piece of paper would have made the postage treble. Its fellow-letter, a single sheet of " double demy," being twice the size of the sheet of sixteen pages which the reader is now perusing, was charged sixpence only!

tially submitting the naked facts of a case to a jury, rather than that of the advocate dressing them up to serve the interests of his client. We shall resist, if possible, indulging in a single epithet, though at the risk of some popularity. Sufficient appeals to the sympathies of the public in favour of the plan have been already made. On the present occasion we propose to address ourselves chiefly to its reason.

We have three main inquiries: 1. The justice of a uniform rate; 2. The profit or loss of a penny rate; and 3. The interests of the general revenue. As our facts are numerous, and in order to fix the reader's attention to the point in discussion, we shall give a general heading to each section of the inquiry.

1. THE JUSTICE OF A UNIFORM RATE.

The Reason of a varying Rate.

To find this, the various elements of cost which make up 66 Postage" must be specified. Every letter, be its postage a penny only, or five shillings, pays for its reception at one postoffice,-its sortation, stamping and packing in the mail-bag,its carriage-its reception at another post-office-and its final delivery at its destination. It It pays besides a proportionate share of the cost of general superintendence, and of the Revenue Tax. One posted single-sheet letter differs from another, so far as postage is concerned, only as respects the distance it has to be carried. Difference in transit alone causes a different charge. Every other operation above enumerated is the same on every letter. No greater skill or time is expended in marking a shilling on a letter than a penny. Both letters are stamped with the same stamp; and the postman may be kept waiting at the house-door ten minutes for either postage. Does difference in the transit of letters warrant the difference of charge imposed by the PostOffice? This, therefore, becomes the first question to be answered.

The Number of Letters carried, and not distance, chiefly determines the Cost of Carriage.

At first sight it seems self-evident, that a letter carried a hundred miles ought to be charged higher postage than one

carried a single mile. Edinburgh is seven times more distant from the metropolis than Brighton. If one messenger be sent to Edinburgh, and another to Brighton, each with a single letter, it is clear that the expenses of the first will be seven times greater than those of the last. Say the Brighton messenger charges ten shillings, the Edinburgh one will charge seventy shillings: one letter will therefore cost ten, the other seventy shillings. But instead of taking only one, suppose the Brighton messenger takes ten letters, and the Edinburgh messenger seventy-a shilling would become in both cases the cost of each letter, though one travels seven times the distance of the other. Would it then be just, in this instance, to charge the Edinburgh letter seven times higher than the one sent to Brighton? Carry the same illustration a step further, and suppose the number of the Brighton letters to remain at ten, while the Edinburgh letters rise to 140 in number; the Edinburgh expenses are then reduced to sixpence each letter. Ought not the carriage of the Edinburgh letter to be half that of the Brighton letter? It is not in this case the distance which regulates the relative cost of carriage for each letter, but the number of letters. It is equally clear that letters forwarded to a shorter may actually cost more than those to a longer distance. The carriage of letters by the mails is precisely analogous to the cases we have put, and we can appeal to positive data, oddly enough furnished by the Postmaster-General himself in defending the present system,expressly to show, that distance alone really does not regulate the cost of transit. The mails, like the messenger, are paid a fixed sum for each trip, according to the distance they go. The number of letters varies,-a small number frequently dividing the lesser,-a large number the greater expense. Thus the cost of the carriage of the mail* to Louth, 148 miles from London, (which is 27. Os. 9d.,) being divided among 365 letters for one trip (allowing nothing to the account of the carriage of the newspapers, franks and parliamentary papers), gives a cost of carriage greater on each letter than the 37. 19s. 7 d. of the Edinburgh mail, 400 miles from London, when charged on 1555 let

*See Second Report, App. p. 257. and Lord Lichfield's Evidence.