The simple adoption of Uniform Cheap Postage would hardly fail of
securing, in the end, all other desirable postal reforms. An act of
congress, in five lines, enacting that “hereafter the postage on all
letters prepaid, not exceeding half an ounce in weight, shall be two
cents; and for each additional half ounce, two cents; and if not prepaid
the postage shall be doubled,” would at no distant period, bring in all
the other desired improvements. The adoption of cheap postage in Great
Britain, greatly improved the system of local delivery of letters and
newspapers in the large towns. Formerly, an additional charge of 1_d._ was
made for the delivery of letters by carriers, in the case of letters that
had been mailed; and for “drop letters,” or letters delivered in the same
town where they are posted, the price was 2_d._ Now all drop letters are
charged at the uniform rate of 1_d._ the same as mail letters; and the
mail letters are delivered by carriers without additional charge—the penny
postage paying all. The Postmaster-General prescribes what places shall
have the free delivery, and how far it shall extend around each
post-office.
Beyond those limits, and in places where the free delivery is not judged
practicable, the local postmasters are at liberty, on their own
discretion, to employ penny-post carriers to deliver letters at the houses
of the people, charging 1_d._ each for delivery, which is a private
perquisite—the department taking neither profit nor responsibility in the
case. Persons who do not choose to pay the penny-post can refuse to
receive letters in that way, and obtain them by calling at the
post-office.
To facilitate this local free-delivery, there are “receiving houses”
established at convenient distances in the town, where letters are
deposited for the mails, without a fee, and thence are taken to the
post-office in season for the daily mails, or for distribution through the
local delivery. These receiving houses are generally established in a drug
or stationery store, grocery, or some retail shop, where the nature of the
business requires some one to be always in attendance, and where the
increase of custom likely to arise from the resort of people with letters
is a sufficient consideration for the slight trouble of keeping the
office. The letters are taken to the post-office at stated hours, by
persons employed for that purpose; those which are to be mailed are
separated, and those which are for local delivery sorted and delivered to
the carriers to go out by the next delivery. I have not a list of the
number or size of the cities and towns within which the free delivery is
enjoyed. Its necessary effect in increasing the number of letters sent by
mail, and benefiting the country and the government by the aid it
furnishes to trade and general prosperity, would seem to be a guaranty
that the department would be likely to extend the free delivery as far as
it could possibly answer, within the reasonable ability of the government,
to meet the reasonable wants of the people.
The London District Post was originally a penny post, and was created by
private enterprise. One William Dockwra, in the reign of Charles II., set
up a private post for the delivery of letters in the city of London, for
which the charge was 1_d_., payable invariably in advance. It was soon
taken possession of by the government, and the same rate of postage
retained until 1801, when, for the sake of revenue, the postage was
doubled, and so remained until the establishment of the general penny
postage. Its limits were gradually extended to include the city of
Westminster and the borough of Southwark, then all places within a circle
of three miles, and finally to twelve miles from the General Post-Office.
Within the three miles circle there are 220 receiving houses, of which 180
are within the town portions of the district. At these offices, letters
are despatched to the post-office, ten times daily, viz. at 8, 10, and 12,
in the morning, and 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 8, in the afternoon. Letters are
required to be left at the receiving house a quarter of an hour previous
to the hour. The letters so left may be expected to be delivered within
the three miles circle in about two hours from the hour at which they are
sent to the post-office; that is, the 8 o’clock letters are delivered by
10, and so on.
There are now ten deliveries daily, within a circle of three miles from
the post-office; five deliveries in a circle of six miles, and three
deliveries to the circle of twelve miles distance. In the three miles
circle, the delivery is completed in one hour and a quarter from the time
the carrier leaves the office; in the six miles circle, in two hours, and
in the twelve miles circle, in three hours.
In 1839, the estimated average of letters passing through the London
district post was about one million every four weeks, of which 800,000 or
four-fifths were unpaid. In 1842, the average was two millions in four
weeks, of which only 100,000, or one-twentieth, were unpaid—ninety-five
per cent. being prepaid. In 1847, the number was nearly three millions.
These do not include the “General Post;” that is the country and foreign
letters to London, but only those that originate as well as end within the
twelve miles circle.
The General Post letters, however, are distributed on the same principle
of free delivery, without extra charge, and the utmost diligence is used
by the letter-carriers to find out the persons to whom letters are
directed. I was witness to this, in the case of a gentleman from Ohio, who
went to England in a merchant ship, without having taken the precaution to
give his family any instructions as to the direction of letters. His
voyage was somewhat long, and before he had been three days in London, the
carrier brought to his lodgings a letter from his wife, which had come in
the mail steamer, and the people at the post-office had sought him out, an
entire stranger among two millions of people! The General Post letters
passing through the London office, were estimated in 1839 at 1,622,147,
each four weeks, of which only one-sixth were prepaid. In 1847, they were
8,500,000, of which above ninety-four per cent. were prepaid. This makes
the whole number of letters mailed and delivered in London, equal to above
146,000,000 a year; of which it is reasonable to calculate that about
75,000,000 are distributed by the letter-carriers by Free Delivery.
As nineteen-twentieths of the letters are prepaid, the delivery is
accomplished with great despatch. The greater proportion of them, of
course, go to those who are in the habit of receiving numbers of letters
daily, and with whom the carriers are well acquainted. A large proportion
are delivered at counting-rooms and shops, which are open. Most houses
where letters are received daily, have letter-boxes by the door, fitted
with an ingenious contrivance to guard against robbery, into which prepaid
letters can be dropped from the street, to be taken out by a door that is
locked on the inside. Thus the great bulk of the letters are delivered
with little more trouble or loss of time to the carrier, than it takes to
serve the daily newspaper. The cases are also much more numerous than with
newspapers, where many letters are deliverable at one place, which of
course lessens the amount of labor chargeable to each one.
There are ninety-five bell-men, who call at every door in their several
districts once a day, and take letters to the post-office in time for the
evening mails. Each one carries a locked bag, with an aperture large
enough to drop in a letter, which can only be opened at the post-office.
Any person having letters to go by mail, may drop them into this bag, pay
the bell-man his fee of 1_d_., and be quite sure they will be despatched
the same evening.
All these carriers are required to assist, at stated times, in the sorting
of letters, both for the free delivery and for the mails. They are paid by
a stipulated salary, and have a permanent business, with chances for
advancement in business and wages, according to length of service and
merit.
A letter was addressed through the newspapers to the Postmaster-General of
the United States, by Barnabas Bates, Esq., of New York, one of the most
able and efficient advocates of postal reform, bearing date February 7,
1847, urging the adoption of a similar system for the city of New York,
and other cities—the postage to be in all cases prepaid. The advantages to
be anticipated are thus set forth by Mr. Bates:
“The adoption of this plan will ultimately be a source of revenue
to the post-office department.
“1. It will be the means of diminishing the number of dead letters
and newspapers, which is increasing every day to an incredible
amount. The carriers will not carry out letters or papers where
there is any doubt of getting their pay, consequently the number
of advertised letters is daily increasing, and as for dead
newspapers, they are sold by cart loads. Half a cent is not a
sufficient inducement to carry out newspapers, especially if there
be any doubt of getting the postage; hence the many complaints of
editors that their subscribers do not get their papers.
“2. It will reduce the list of advertised letters which has
increased within a few years more than three hundred per cent. The
Sun and Tribune of last Saturday, advertised 1700 letters, which
cost sixty-eight dollars; if this be the average weekly number,
the post-office department or the people must pay for advertising,
the sum of three thousand five hundred and thirty-six dollars per
annum! The list of advertised letters of the Boston post-office,
which is semi-monthly, averages from fourteen to sixteen columns
of the Boston Times. If efficient carriers were appointed to
deliver these letters to their address free of expense, this list
would be reduced more than one half; thus a saving would be made
in advertising, besides the collection of a large amount of
postage. I would further remark, that requiring _four cents_ to be
paid for advertising, in addition to the postage, frequently
deters poor people from taking out their letters, and thus the
cost of advertising, as well as the postage, are lost to the
General Post-office. An efficient free delivery would save the
department thousands of dollars every year.
“3. A free delivery of letters would increase the revenue by
causing the greater portion of the drop letters to be sent through
the post-office, instead of the private offices now established in
different parts of the city. The only reason why the City Despatch
Post failed was, that they charged more than the private penny
post offices. But if these letters were delivered free, charging
only two cents as drop letters, nearly all the city correspondence
would be conveyed through this medium. The increased income from
this source alone would in a short time be amply sufficient to pay
the salaries of all the carriers.
“4. The post-office would not only command all the drop letters,
but afford such easy, safe, and cheap facilities for the
conveyance of letters, that it would be the means of increasing
the city and country correspondence to an extent which can hardly
be estimated. Thousands and tens of thousands of letters which are
now sent by private hands, or through the private penny post,
would then be deposited in the United States sub post-offices,
both for city delivery and to be forwarded by the mails.”
The extent to which such a system of Free Delivery could properly be
introduced in this country, can only be determined by experiment. That is,
to decide in how many and what towns there shall be a Free Delivery, and
how far from the post-office the Free Delivery shall be carried,
experience must be the guide. A city and its suburbs might all be included
in one arrangement, as New York with Brooklyn, Williamsburg, and Jersey
City; Boston with Charlestown, Cambridge, Chelsea and Roxbury; and as
population increases and intercourse extends, other places might be
included.
Such a system would make a vast amount of business for itself, as people
learned the advantages of so easy a correspondence—especially in those
places which may admit of two or more deliveries a day. It would also tend
to facilitate and stimulate and increase the general business of the
place, and this would in turn increase the business of the post-office.
The establishment of Free Delivery in any city or large town, would tend
to increase the correspondence of the country with such town. Every
addition to the number of letters delivered, would lessen the average cost
of delivery of each letter, and thus increase the net profits of the
institution. In these ways the department would feel its way along, in the
extension of Free Delivery from one class of towns to another, until, at
no distant day, it would be found that its benefits were far more widely
diffusible than the most sanguine could now anticipate.
On the subject of the cost of delivery, the parliamentary committee
obtained many valuable items of information. Mr. Reid, of London, said he
got a thousand circulars delivered lately, for a foreigner. The gentleman
had intended to send them through the post-office, paying the postage. Mr.
Reid told him he would get them delivered a great deal cheaper. He gave
them to a very trusty person, who delivered them all in the course of a
week, at the expense of £1 2_s_. 3_d_. They were certain he delivered
them; for nearly every time they sent him out, they took care to misdirect
two or three, taking an account of the false direction, and he invariably
brought back these letters, because he could not find the persons to whom
they were directed. The postage of these circulars, at 1_d_. would have
been £4 3_s_. 4_d_. Here was a saving of £3 1_s_. 1_d_. in one job. The
expense of delivery was 1-1/14 farthing per letter. Of course, regular
carriers, in their accustomed routes, could deliver prepaid letters at a
much cheaper rate than this.
During the parliamentary investigations on the subject of cheap postage, a
plan was suggested, of establishing what were called secondary mails, to
reach every village and hamlet in the country. These secondary mails were
to run from each post-town to the surrounding places, and deliver letters
for an additional charge of 1_d_. But on consideration it was found
impracticable to clog the general system with this addition. Uniformity
was everything, to the system. And they could not establish any uniform
rate which would answer both for the post-towns and for the hamlets. The
rate which would pay for the towns, would not pay for mails to the
hamlets. And the rate which was necessary for the hamlets, was too high
for the towns, and _the contraband conveyance would still continue_.
Consequently, the post-office would have to distribute the letters to the
smaller places, where the distribution is attended with the greatest cost
and the smallest profits. In the end, the rule of uniformity was left
unbroken, and it was left to future experience or local arrangement to
meet the wants of the smaller places, not now reached by the mails. The
local postmasters are to make such arrangements as they deem proper in
their respective neighborhoods, as to the employment of penny-post
carriers to distribute the letters at the houses of the people.
To show the working of multiplication and division in the increase of
profits, and the very low rate at which a service similar to that of free
delivery can be performed, let us look at the newspapers. The principal
daily papers in Boston are served to subscribers by carriers, at the
expense of the publishers. Deducting Sundays and holidays, there are 310
papers in a year. These are served at the cost of 25 to 50 cents for each
subscriber. Taking the highest cost, and you pay 1.6 _mills_ for each
paper delivered—less than one-sixth of a cent.
The penny papers are served to subscribers by carriers, who have regular
beats or districts; and who furnish their patrons for six cents per week.
These carriers purchase the papers of the publisher, at 62 to 75 cents per
100; so that their profits on each paper are from one-quarter to
three-eighths of a cent. For this they deliver the paper promptly every
morning, and collect the money on Saturday, running, of course, some risk
of losses by bad debts, &c. And yet this business is found to be so
profitable that some routes in New York have been sold, that is, the good
will transferred, for at least $500, just for the privilege of serving
that district.
The two-cent papers from New York are regularly served to customers in
Boston. A person engaged in this business used to buy the New York
Express, Tribune, and Herald, for 1¼ to 1½ cents each. He paid the cost of
bringing them by express from New York. To guard against failures, he
divided his bundles, and had a part sent by way of Norwich, and a part by
Stonington. He then served them to subscribers all over Boston for 12
cents per week, making his collections on Saturday. This man made money,
so that in a few years he sold out his route and business in the New York
papers, and purchased an interest in a flourishing penny paper in Boston,
of which he is now one of the publishers.