Nor has all the Star Route grafting and stealing been stopped, though both Postmaster General Hitchcock and his recent predecessor, Mr. George B. Cortelyou, deserve great praise for having eliminated much of it, and Mr. Hitchcock’s active, continued efforts to further clean out that Augean stable must command the hearty approval of every honest citizen. But, as just stated, some of the original graft and steal still lingers.

Last year I personally investigated one Star Route. It was a twenty-mile drive (round trip). The contractor was receiving $600 or more a year for the service. What he paid the villager to cover the route with his patriarchal team I do not know. The villager, however, picked up a little on the side by hauling over his drive local parcels, some merchandise and an occasional passenger. I watched his mail deliveries to the village office for ten days. On no day did the revenue to the government exceed sixty cents, and on seven of the ten days it was below twenty cents. One day it was but ten cents.

In this connection it should also be mentioned that the village which that Star Route was presumed to serve was on a regular rural route and received fully 95% of its mail by special carrier service connecting with a trunk line station only six miles away.

But to return to my objection to the manifest efforts of the Postmaster General and of recommendations in the Penrose-Overstreet report to adopt methods or secure legislation to restrain increase in both the circulation and the copy-weight of periodicals. Of course if the government really sustains a loss on the carriage and handling of second-class matter, the loss would be greater on 160 tons than on 80 tons. I, however, contend, and shall later prove, that—barring waste, payroll loafing and stealage—the government now transports and handles second-class matter at a profit.

Postmaster General Hitchcock, so far as I have found time to read him, has made no particular effort to restrict or limit the piece or copy-weight of periodicals. He was, seemingly at least, so occupied in his efforts to “get” a few periodicals through the means of that unconstitutional “rider” of his that he had little or no time for anything else. But the 1906-7 commission boldly advocated a penalizing of periodical weight for copies mailed to piece, or individual, addresses.

A table of graduated increases is given and some very peculiar argument, to put it mildly, is presented to support the recommended scale, or system, of weight penalization. Following I quote from pages 28-29 of the commission’s report. The italics are mine:

The rate then for copy service would be one-eighth of a cent per copy not to exceed 2 ounces, one-quarter cent per copy not to exceed 4 ounces, and one-half cent for each additional 4 ounces or fraction thereof to be prepaid in money as second-class postage is now paid. Tabulated, it would appear thus:

Not exceeding—Cents.
2 ounces⅛
4 ounces¼
8 ounces¾
12 ounces1¼
16 ounces1¾
20 ounces2¼
24 ounces2¾
28 ounces3¼
Etc., etc.

The net result calculated by the pound will be, upon the periodicals above the average weight of 4 ounces and not exceeding a pound, a change from 1 to about 1¾ cents per pound. For heavier periodicals the rate would average 1⅞ cents per pound for those weighing 2 pounds, and increasing by an infinitesimal fraction with the proportion of weight above 4 ounces but never reaching, no matter how heavy the periodical may grow, the limit of 2 cents per pound.