Cheap Postage

We are glad to see this subject is about to be presented by numerous petitions to the present Congress. The following form we presume will meet the wishes of a large portion of the publishers and readers in the Northern, Southern and Western portions of the Union. The carriage of newspapers on any other principle than a rate according to weight and distance hinders the reduction of letter postage,—is unjust to 999 out of every thousand printers and aids eastern monopolies against all other portions of the country. Every publisher of a state and county paper should cut out the petition—get it filled with names, and send it immediately to Washington.

PETITION

1. The undersigned respectfully petition that the rates of letter postage be reduced to the lowest standard by which the department can be sustained, while at the same time it affords the safest and most expeditious transit to the mails.

2. That the rates of newspaper postage br graduated according to the only equitable principle of weight and distance, fixing the 8th or 4th of a cent as the minimum charge for 100 miles, and increasing at the same rates, thus:—100 miles, ⅛; 200 miles, ¼; 400 miles, ½; 800 miles, one cent; 1600 miles, 2; cents; 2500 and over 3; cents or fixing the minimum at ¼ cent for one hundred miles, thus:—100, ¼; cent; 200, ½; 400, 1 cent; 800 miles, 2 cents; 1200 and over, 3 cents.

Your petitioners are aware that this is the only equitable principle; and justice to readers and publishers in all parts of the country, requires its adoption.

We submit the following, among other reasons, why our petition should be granted.

1. It would aid in a safe reduction of letter postage. The immense weight of the mails caused by the transportation of papers to great distances, not only retards expedition, but it increases the cost of conveyance to the department, and thus prevents a lower rate on letters.

2. The conveyance of papers on any other principle than that of justice to all, is not necessary for the good of the public, but hinders public good in many ways. By the telegraph wires, [?] simultaneously to all important [?] privilege [?] spreads Congressional Documents through the land. The literary and scientific attainments of the country, necessary to make a newspaper valuable, are diffused. Every thing that is necessary to instruct and inform the masses, through the columns of the newspaper, is found not only in eastern cities, but in all portions of our free republic. Vices abound in the larger cities—but it will hardly be deemed expedient by Congress that unjust facilities should be granted to transport their evils through the country.

3. The present rates of newspaper postage are unjust to all publishers and readers who are not in the district of two or three large cities.

It is unjust to publishers, because their material for printing, especially in the Southern and Western States, has, in part to be procured from the East. Upon this they have to pay transportation in proportion to weight and distance; and when their work is in the market, the Post Office carries the printed sheets with little regard to distances or weight, and throws them into the same market,—thus by unjust rates, granting eastern mechanics and capitalists an advantage over hose in other regions of the country.

It is unjust to all readers of local newspapers at the North West and South. Local papers must be sustained, in order that the public interests of every county and every state may be known to the people. The existence of such papers is a political necessity. Yet their circulation is limited and consequently their size and value to their readers of all parties, is decreased, by the inequitable charges of the Post Office Department which circulates papers of large sizes, but of no political or moral value to the people,—thus prejudicing the existence, and curtailing the circulation of local papers necessary for the information of the people, by introducing papers which cannot subserve county or state interests.

The immense masses of newspapers sent through the mails to great distances, retards the mails sometimes for days, and thus State papers fail of reaching their destination for several days on account of the bags being so full and heavy with eastern papers that they are left back when the roads are bad—thus detaining local news and despatches, for which publishers have paid, and which is much more recent than that contained in Eastern sheets,) from their readers.

For these and other reasons, your petitioners pray that all newspapers may be subjected to the equitable principle of rates in proportion to weight and distance. [Chicago Tribune?]