The republic. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1849-1853, 1849-08-07

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council of Great Britain, that his letters bad
been intercepted and opened, stating thsthe
could not persuade himself that the gov
eminent of England, SO noble and gen.
erous, should have so unfair mind as to
open the letters of an ambassador, and by
this means to violate the laws, and to give
an example to the World so damnable, and
of SO little respect towards the minister OF
the Serenissima Respubica."
M. GUIZoT, on one occasion, in refer
ence to charge that had been made of
espionagein the French post Office, declared
in the French Chamber that in law and in
fact the correspondence of the French peo-
pie was inviolable; declaration which,
when repeated in the British House of
Commons, was received with shouts of
derision. Even as late as 1874, the letters
directed to the Italian refugee, MAzzINI,
were stopped and opened in London for
four months, under the warrant of the Sec
rotary of State for the Home Department.
About the same time, Mr.. CHARLES SToLz-
MAN, Polish refugee, presented a petit
ton to the House of Commons complain
ing that letters addressed to him were
secretly detained and opened at the post
Office, and that the system of espionage
was carried on to so great an extent that
he could no longer avail himself Of the
"sacred privileges" hitherto supposed to
belong to her majesty's post office. And
in the course of his investigation of these
cases, which he was charged with the duty
of presenting to the House of Commons,
Mr.. T. DUNCoMBE ascertained, beyond all
question, that letters directed to himself
had also been subjected to the examination
of clerks in the post office.
But whilst these powers have been thus
exercised by European governments, they
have been uniformly in all countries abom.
mated and denounced by the people. No
liberal English statesman, in the debates
in the two houses growing out of the cases
of MAzzINI and SToLzMAN, ventured to
approve its exercise. Many condemned
it as utterly illegal and unconstitutional,
and to be defended only on the ground Of
usage based upon state necessity. But
there was no one who ventured to defend
the system on its merits, or to suggest that
it was inconsistent with the spirit of the
age, or with popular liberty.
In this country, fortunately, there can
be no question raised as to power. Clearly
enough, the power does not exist in any
magistrate, State or Federal, to violate
the sanctity of sealed letter, under any
pretence whatever. The idea, therefore,
that the opposition papers are very sedu-
lousy circulating at the South-that the
Postmaster General, or any other officer
of the Government, has or can have any
control over any thing that goes into the
mails or comes out of them, or that he is
in any wise responsible for the contents of
the mails-is only one of those absurdities
which are sometimes seized upon by stul-
tilted politicians for base party purposes.
Every form of government tampering with
the post office has been denounced by
our ancestors in the Old World ever since
the institution was established; and, as
long as they are able to read or write,
we have no fear that any portion of the
American people will be base enough to
require or tolerate it.