Cheap Postage

by Joshua Leavitt

The post-office being, then, like the army and navy, a necessary branch of the government, it follows that the charge of postage for the conveyance of letters and papers is of the nature of a tax, as has been well expressed by the present Postmaster-General, in his last annual [pg 025] report, quoted above. “Postage is a tax, not only on the business of the country, but upon intelligence and knowledge, and the exercise of the friendly and social affections.” The question before us is, How heavy a “tax” ought the government of a federal republic to impose on these interests? Every friend of freedom and of human improvement answers spontaneously, that nothing but a clear necessity can justify any tax at all upon such subjects, and that the tax should be reduced, in all cases, to the very lowest practicable rate. The experience of the British government, the prodigious increase of correspondence produced by cheap postage, and the immense revenue accruing therefrom, demonstrate that TWO CENTS is not below the rate which the government can afford to receive. Let the people understand that all beyond this is a mere “tax,” not required by any necessity, and they will soon demand that the government look for its resources to some more suitable subjects of taxation than these.

Another rule of right in regard to this “tax” is well laid down in the Report of the House Committee, for 1844: “As the post-office is made to sustain itself solely by a tax on correspondence, it should derive aid and support from everything which it conveys. No man's private correspondence should go free, since the expense of so conveying it becomes a charge upon the correspondence of others; and the special favor thus given, and which is much abused by being extended to others not contemplated by law, is unjust and odious. Neither should the public correspondence be carried free of charge where such immunity operates as a burden upon the correspondence of the citizen. There is no reason why the public should not pay its postages as well as citizens—no sufficient reason why this item of public expenses should not be borne, like all others, by the general tax paid into the treasury.” These remarks are made, indeed, with reference to the franking privilege, which the committee properly proposed to abolish on the grounds here set forth. But it is plain that the principle is equally pertinent to the question of taxing the correspondence of the thickly settled parts of the country for the purpose of raising means to defray the expense of sending mails to the new and distant parts of the country. There is no justice in it. The extension of these mails is a duty of the government; and let the government, by the same rule, pay the cost out of its own treasury. “Postage,” says the same report, “in the large towns and contiguous places, is, in part, a contribution.” It is a forced contribution, levied not upon the property of the people, but upon their intelligence and affections.

Our letters are taxed to pay the following expenses:

1. For the franking of seven millions of free letters.

2. For the distribution of an immense mass of congressional documents, which few people read at all, and most of which might as well be sent in some other way—would be seen the moment they should be actually subjected to the payment of postage by those who send or receive them.

3. For the extension of mails over numerous and long routes, in the new or thinly settled parts of the country, which do not pay their own expenses. I do not believe these routes are more extensive or numerous than the government ought to establish; but then the government [pg 026] ought to support them out of the general treasury. Many of them are necessary for the convenience of the government itself. For many of them the treasury is amply remunerated, and more, by the increased sale of the public lands, the increase of population, and the consequent increase of the revenue from the custom-house. And the rest are required by the great duty of self-preservation and self-advancement, which is inherent in our institutions.

4. For the cost of about two millions of dead letters, and an equal number of dead newspapers and pamphlets, the postage on which, at existing rates, would amount to at least $175,000 a year, and the greater part of which would be saved under the new postal system.

Why should these burdens be thrown as a “tax upon correspondence,” or made an apology for the continuance of such a tax? It is unreasonable. All these expenses should be borne, “like all others, by the general tax paid into the treasury.” This would leave letters chargeable only with such a rate of postage as is needed for the prevention of abuses, and to secure the orderly performance of the public duty. And a postage of two cents would amply suffice for this. Some have suggested that one cent is all that ought to be required.

There is another view of the matter, which shows still more strongly the injustice of the present tax upon letters. “It is not matter of inference,” says Mr. Rowland Hill, “but matter of fact, that the expense of the post-office is practically the same, whether a letter is going from London to Burnet (11 miles), or from London to Edinburgh (397 miles); the difference is not expressible in the smallest coin we have.” The cost of transit from London to Edinburgh he explained to be only one thirty-sixth of a penny. And the average cost, per letter, of transportation in all the mails of the kingdom, did not differ materially from this. Of course, it was impossible to vary the rates of postage according to distance, when the longest distance was but a little over one-tenth of a farthing. The same reasoning is obviously applicable to all the productive routes in the United States. And we have seen the injustice of taxing the letters on routes that are productive or self-supporting, to defray the expense of the unproductive routes which the government is bound to create and pay for.

Another view of the case shows the futility of the attempt to make distance the basis of charge. The actual cost of transit, to each letter, does not vary with the distance, but is inversely as the number of letters, irrespective of distance. The weight of letters hardly enters into the account as a practical consideration. Ten thousand letters, each composed of an ordinary sheet of letter paper, would weigh but one hundred and fifty-six pounds, about the weight of a common sized man, who would be carried from Boston to Albany or New York for five dollars. The average cost of transportation of the mails in this country, is a little over six cents per mile. For convenience of calculation, take a route of ten miles long, which costs ten cents per mile, and another of one hundred miles long at the same rate. There are many routes which do not carry more than one letter on the average. The letter would cost the department one dollar for carrying it ten miles. On the route of one hundred miles we will suppose there are one thousand letters to be carried, which will cost the government for [pg 027] transportation just one mill per letter. How then can we make distance the basis of postage?