Note 203 — Chapter VII · CONCERNING SOME OF THE POPULAR MISCONCEPTIONS AND MISREPRESENTATIONS TO WHICH THE POST-OFFICE IS LIABLE.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer, in his place in Parliament, has just adverted (April) to the argument indicated above. "If the Post-Office revenue be abandoned in whole, or in part, a gap will be created which will have to be supplied by direct taxation." That our postage rates may be regarded as a kind of mild taxation, not unfairly levied, and that the work is done by the State with more uniformity of purpose and greater regularity than would be possible under any private company, our senators agree, perhaps with the single exception of Mr. Roebuck. That gentleman, however, it will be remembered, held that Sebastapol might have been reduced more easily had the business been made a subject of contract! With respect to the state monopoly and the advantages derived from it, political economists are also pretty well agreed. Blackstone has been referred to previously. Sergeant Stephens, in his Commentaries, endorses Blackstone's views. Mr. M'Cullagh, in his Principles of Political Economy, is so clear on this point that we venture to make a quotation: "Perhaps, with the single exception of the carriage of letters, there is no branch of industry which Government had not better leave to be conducted by individuals. It does not, however, appear that the Post-Office could be so well conducted by any other party as by Government; the latter only can enforce perfect regularity in all its subordinate departments, can carry it into the smallest villages and even beyond the frontier, and can combine all its separate parts into one uniform system on which the public may rely for security and despatch. Besides providing for the speedy and safe communication of intelligence, the Post-Office has everywhere almost been rendered subservient to fiscal purposes, and made a source of revenue; and provided the duty on letters be not so heavy as to oppose any very serious obstacle to the frequency and facility of correspondence, it seems to be a most unobjectionable tax; and is paid and collected with little trouble and inconvenience." Fourth Edition, 1849, pp. 296-7. See also M'Cullagh's Commercial Dictionary, where he speaks still more decidedly, and Mr. Senior's Political Economy. Sydney Smith, who with Mr. M'Cullagh was opposed to the penny-postage movement, was favourable to the Government monopoly of the Post-Office.