Postal Riders and Raiders

by W. H. Gantz

I am presenting just here, only local protests—Chicago protests. Similar objections were heard from all parts of the country. The Chicago protest, however, would not be complete unless we presented the resolutions adopted by Typographical Union No. 16, at a regular meeting held July 30, 1911. It applies both to the proposed increase in second-class postage rates and to Mr. Hitchcock’s unjust discrimination in distributing periodicals:

Whereas, It is a fundamental economic truth that anything which tends to unduly and unjustly raise the cost of distributing the product of labor reduces the opportunity for employment of those concerned in the industry thus affected, and indirectly becomes a menace to all industry, Chicago Typographical Union No. 16, embracing a membership of more than 4,000 skilled craftsmen, takes this method of entering its emphatic protest against any increase in the rate for second-class mail matter; and,

Whereas, The proposed routing of semi-monthly and monthly publications by fast freight instead of by the regular fast mail service is manifestly unjust and is a flagrant discrimination against our product, this organization further condemns those who contemplate this pernicious innovation, and we submit that the installation of this system by the Postoffice Department is not only inimical to our welfare as workingmen but will work incalculable injury to the publishing interests of the entire country; and,

Whereas, These propositions of the Postoffice Department deserve only the strongest condemnation, and as a means of making this protest effective, we hereby invite the working people of the United States to unite with us in a movement having for its purpose the overhauling and readjustment of the postal affairs of this country, to the end that the service may become one of greater convenience to our people and be an instrument of promotion to the industries of our country instead of a leaden handicap on our industrial progress and the educational improvement of all the people; therefore, be it,

Resolved, That for the protection of the printing industry we hereby instruct our delegates to the next annual convention of the International Typographical Union to propose the following for the consideration of that body, and they are hereby instructed to support the indorsement of the same by the said International Typographical Union convention:

Resolved, That the International Typographical Union emphatically opposes any advance in the rate of postage on second-class mail matter, and that it condemns the proposed method of distributing semi-monthly and monthly periodicals by fast freight instead of by the regular fast mail, to the facilities of which they are entitled under the law, because they pay for the same.

The foregoing quotations are sufficient to show that the printing trades of the nation are awake to the industrial significance of legislation of the Hitchcock “rider” nature, likewise that they are equally wideawake to the purpose of Mr. Hitchcock—ulterior or other—in his attempt to stealth such legislation into operative law.

How many people are employed in the printing trades in this country? I do not know.

In Chicago alone there are, at a safe estimate, not less than 40,000. A representative of the organized pressmen of New York before the Postal Commission testified that there were 12,000 pressmen in New York City and that six thousand of these were employed on presses which print monthly and weekly magazines.