"These cars are constructed and fitted up by the railroads in accordance with plans and specifications furnished by the Department, and the amount of mail transported therein is determined exclusively by the postal authorities. From these two facts it results that the railroad must haul 100,000 pounds of car when the weight of the mail actually carried therein is only from 3,500 to 5,000 pounds—often very much less, and occasionally somewhat more.
"Taking in view all these facts, as disclosed by the testimony filed herewith, we are of opinion that the 'prices paid * * * as compensation for the postal-car service' are not excessive, and recommend that no reduction be made therein so long as the methods, conditions, and requirements of the postal service continue the same as at present."
MAIL RATES AND EXPRESS RATES.
No feature of this question has been more persistently misrepresented than the relative value to the railroads of the mail business and the express business.
As elsewhere shown, the express business is 52 per cent more valuable to the Burlington road than the Government mails on the mere basis of space used and facilities furnished in passenger trains. There are many other considerations which increase this disparity of value in favor of the express, but reference to them is omitted in order to direct public attention to the following statements of the Postmaster-General in his recent letter upon the subject:
(Congressional Record, March 4, 1910, 61st Congress, Second Session, Vol. 45, No. 60, Page 2802.)
Letter of the Postmaster-General Relative to the Service Rendered by the Railroad Companies in Connection With the Mails and With Express.
"Office of the Postmaster-General,
"Washington, D.C., January 31, 1910.
"Hon. John W. Weeks,
Chairman Committee on Post Offices and
Post Roads, House of Representatives.