But Burritt's proposal was not that which was accomplished so long afterward. In his own words:[161]—
By the term "Ocean Penny Postage" we mean simply this:—That the single service of transporting a letter, weighing under half-an-ounce, from any port of the United Kingdom to any port beyond the sea, at which the British mail-packets may touch, shall be performed by the British Government for one penny; or one penny for its mere conveyance from Folkestone to Boulogne, Liverpool to Boston, &c., and vice versa. Thus the entire charge upon a letter transmitted from any town in the United Kingdom to any port beyond the sea, would be two pence;—one penny for the inland rate, and the other for the ocean rate.
Of course this does not reckon in what might be added for an inland rate at the "port beyond the sea", but the main point was the transportation on the ocean part of the journey at a uniform rate of one penny.
This was practically accomplished—and even bettered—by the establishment of the Universal Postal Union in 1875; for where Burritt wrote:[162]— "It would meet the terms of our proposition if every letter under half an ounce, from any town in Great Britain to any town in the Colonies, should pay three pence; one penny for the home inland rate, another penny for the ocean, and the third for the colonial inland rate, and vice versa" the Postal Union fixed a charge of but twopence halfpenny as the standard rate between all countries that subscribed to its provisions.
To quote further:[163]—
The later discussion in England on the extension of Penny Postage across the seas has alternated between the proposals for Universal Penny Postage and Imperial Penny Postage. Mr. Henry Fawcett, who was Postmaster-General in 1880, was keenly interested in endeavouring to get the Colonies to accept a lower postal rate to and from the Mother Country, but the Colonies were afraid to lower their rates.... Mr. Henniker-Heaton brought up the subject in the House of Commons in 1885 by moving for the opening of negotiations with other Governments, with a view to establishing Universal Penny Postage.... In 1890 the Jubilee of the introduction of Uniform Penny Postage was celebrated in London and throughout the United Kingdom, and public interest in postal matters received a new stimulus.... The long sus
tained agitation for Imperial Penny Postage was at last brought to a definite issue at the Imperial Conference on Postal Rates in 1898. The London Standard of 13th July, 1898, stated:—
"We are authorized by the Postmaster-General to state that, as the result of the Imperial Conference on Postal Rates, it has been agreed, on the proposal of the Representative of the Dominion of Canada, that letter postage of one penny per half-ounce should be established between the United Kingdom, Canada, Newfoundland, the Cape Colony, Natal, and such of the Crown Colonies as may, after communication with, and approval of, Her Majesty's Government, be willing to adopt it. The date on which the reduction will come into effect will be announced later on. The question of a uniform reduced rate for the whole Empire was carefully considered; but it was not found possible to fix upon a rate acceptable to all the Governments concerned. A resolution was therefore adopted, leaving it to those parts of the Empire which were prepared for penny postage to make the necessary arrangements among themselves".
The Postmaster-General who had the distinction of issuing this important communication was the Duke of Norfolk, and the representative of Canada was the Hon. (now Sir) William Mulock, LL. D., Q. C., Postmaster-General of Canada, who gave the chief credit for the reform to the British Empire League.
Nevertheless, Mr. Mulock had been interested not only in the scheme of Imperial Penny Postage but also in endeavoring to obtain a reduction of the Canadian domestic postage to the penny (2 cents) basis. The inland letter rate, it may be remembered, was made 3 cents per half ounce throughout the new Dominion on the 1st April, 1868. Not until the 2nd May, 1889, did legislative enactment raise the limit of weight to one ounce. Meanwhile the United States, on the 1st October, 1883, had lowered its inland rate, which also applied to letters for Canada, to 2 cents per ounce. Agitation for the same reduction had naturally taken place in Canada, but instead of this it was proposed late in 1897[164] to reduce the Postal Union rate of 5 cents per half ounce to the domestic rate of 3 cents per ounce on letters to Great Britain and the Colonies. An Order in Council was actually passed announcing a rate of 3 cents per half ounce to any place in the British Empire, to take effect on 1st January, 1898, but the Imperial authorities objected to it as exceeding Canada's powers as a member of the Postal Union, and it was necessarily abandoned.