[735] "In the present century the Post Office has assumed three new functions—the transmission of money, and telegrams, and the custody of savings. These are alike only in requiring a widespread system of branch offices."—A. M. Ogilvie's article on "The Post Office" in R. H. Inglis Palgrave's Dict. Political Economy, London, 1899, vol. iii. p. 175.
"The so-called 'Post Office' is in fact a collection of different, though connected, industries."—C. F. Bastable, Public Finance, London, 1903, p. 206.
[736] See H. R. Meyer, Public Ownership and the Telephone in Great Britain, New York, 1907.
[737] "To-day, State ownership is the general rule over Europe, and only in America is there private ownership on a large scale. It is significant that the first seizure of this monopoly of the State was in France, on the simple ground that it was not safe to allow so important a device to be in other than the hands of the State. In 1837 a law was passed making every kind of telegraph a State monopoly. This was due to Napoleonic influence. It was not until 1870 that the British Government claimed the monopoly."—John Lee, Economics of Telegraphs and Telephones, London, 1913, p. 2.
[738] "No man can feel a more intimate conviction than I do that, whatever our financial difficulties may be, we must not take measures to meet them which should bear upon the comforts of the labouring classes.... Well, then, I must, with my sense of public duty, abandon the idea of raising a revenue from the Post Office."—Sir R. Peel, 11th March 1842, Parl. Debates (Commons), vol. lxi. col. 434.
"If, therefore, it should also happen that it (the penny) is the best rate adapted ultimately to produce the largest amount of money profit, such a coincidence would be the result of accident, not of design."—Report from Select Committee on Postage, 1843; evidence of Sir Rowland Hill, Answer 74.
"The Post Office, and, since the fall in silver, the Mint, both produce in England a net revenue, but the yield of revenue ought to be considered as purely incidental if not accidental."—J. Shield Nicholson, Principles of Political Economy, London, 1901, vol. iii. p. 372.
As a war measure the United Kingdom has now increased the rate on letters over one ounce in weight. Such letters are, however, only a small proportion of the total number of letters posted (vide supra, p. [33]). Canada has imposed a war tax of one cent on all letters, and on postcards (supra, p. [57]).
[739] Vide Alfred Marshall, Principles of Economics, London, 1907, vol. i. p. 124.
"If I put a letter in the pillar-box rather than walk half a mile to deliver it by hand, it is clear that I value the service at one penny at least, and if its true value is to be taken at less than a penny, it must be assumed that some one would have carried the letter for less than a penny if the Post Office monopoly had been absent. But to deal thoroughly with this question it would be necessary to enter on a discussion of the Austrian theory of value and Marshall's conception of 'consumer's rent.'"—E. Cannan (Memoranda on Classification and Incidence, p. 163).