US Presidency
1882

It will be noticed that both of these reductions were of a radical character and relatively quite as important as that which is now proposed. In each case there ensued a temporary loss of revenue, but a sudden and large influx of business, which substantially repaired that loss within three years. Unless the experience of past legislation in this country and elsewhere goes for naught, it may be safely predicted that the stimulus of 33 1/3 per cent reduction in the tax for carriage would at once increase the number of letters consigned to the mails. The advantages of secrecy would lead to a very general substitution of sealed packets for postal cards and open circulars, and in divers other ways the volume of first class matter would be enormously augmented. Such increase amounted in England, in the first year after the adoption of penny postage, to more than 125 per cent.