Show RATES HIGH ENOUGH SECOND CLASS INCREASE PLAN STIRS publishers efficiency of Hitch cocks management of the post office department attacked by the A N P A washington Washing tom the A V I 1 N P A through its postal committee of which don C seltz seitz of new york Is chair man has joined in the fight against the proposed increase in second class rates and in its last bulletin the corn com attacks the management of the post office department the bulletin is as follows follow st the extent to which the post office department does not carry sec ond class matter Is well revealed in the following abstract of inquiry of publishers conducted by house committee on expenditures in the post office department william A ashbrook chairman concerning the volume weight and handling of the output of publications entered as mall mail matter of the second class for the fiscal year ending june 30 1911 inquiry was made of all publishers approximating thirty thousand of which nearly seventeen thousand are weekly publications r more afore than ten thousand returns were received embracing sixty six plus percent per cent of all tonnage of publications licati ons the publications reporting represent an annual output of more than six and one half billion copies the weight of which was one and three quarter billion pounds these publications delivered by mall mail in ouch period weighed p pounds they delly delivered ered by their own carriers newsboys and news companies pounds of which an unascertained certa ined percentage was carried to destination by express and other rail shipments outside the mall mail they delivered by express pounds and by other rail shipments pounds the rate by express and rail varies from va to 1 cent per pound but the of these shipments went at a rate of to cent per pound the post office for the year ending june 30 1911 handled and excluding one half million pounds tree free in county matt matter dr 10 raf re calved one cent per pound 1 I all this toils goes to add to the absurdity of ef the proposed hitchcock legislation doubling the second class rate feromone fr from omone one to two cents per pound and limiting the privilege to publications that carry as much reading matter as they do advertising the proposition was stupid enough when the postal deficit reached 17 two years ago it becomes preposterous in face of a surplus what business has a transportation corporation which is all the post office Is to prescribe how a business shall be conducted newspapers cannot afford to expand their columns beyond the call of the days news nor can they be expected to control the requirements of their advertisers who have a right to reach the public as copiously as they care to it cannot te be assumed that such legislation will ever get by congress but publishers are requested to fight the theory that the right to send their output by mall mail Is a privilege the figures show it Is not the post office is a badly managed business that is all we should fight its dictation its censor ship and its inefficiency |