The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1856-1888, 1873-05-24
The Foreign Mail Service

The Foreign man service
Is controlled st Washington BY singulArly inefficient
aud stupid hands, IS We have several times had
occasion to remark. The Superintendent Of that
buresn seems 70 be possessed Of the spirit Of his
principal, which is exercised in all manner Of half
penny forced constructions Of law which shall result
in o petty increase Of postal revenue. For example
as to the Postmaster-Geners The law requires
that domestic letters only part prepsid, but on which
one or more full rates have been paid, shall be for
warded to the Pest Offices Of their destination, aud
the balance due collected on delivery, Another pro
vision Of law making double postage necessary 90
unpaid matter forwarded through inadvertence,
General CresWell has decided that double the amount
Of deficit must be collected on psrt-psid matter. The
Dogberry nature Of this ruling Is apparent in the
TACT that letters sent by direction O. an act Of Con-
gress are classei with those Inadvertently forwarded.
The superintendent Of Foreign Mails s. year or
two ago decided that postage Oh " exchanges with
foreign countries must be paid Of transient rates. Ii
is well known that within the United States pub
fishers Of newspapers and periodicals are allowed 10
receive exchanges, l. e, regular publications Tor
which they pay by forwarding copies Of their own.
free Of postage. Perhaps this should not be expected
with respee; TO foreign exchanges. as the government
may not succeed in obtaining treaty concessions 10
that effect But this superintendent decided that
the exchanges could not be sent at the low rates
accorded TO regular subscribers, but must be paid for
at transient rates at the office Of mailing IA the
United States, and at the Office Of reception IN the
Uaitsd States. As if an exchanging publisher were
not a regular subscriber from the fact that he pays
in kind instead of in cash. If Mr.. Blackfan should
by any means have learned that one of our sub
scribers in the Hawaiian Kingdom sent Us news
papers which We credited on account as paymen' for
the ShippIRg Last, he ought 10 have ordered that we
should pay transient instead of quarterly rates on
the papers sent to that subscriber. We have recently
learned in a roundabout way that this decision IN
relation to foreign exchanges is not enforced, which
may be the first g%limmeriug Of q ray Of intelligence
and liberaity.
The phrase made use of above, - learned in q
roundabout way" leads 10 another point, viz, that
Postmasters are not furnished until after long delays
if at all, with notice of changes in the rates of foreign
postage. The direct mail from San Francisco TO
New Zealand has been recently discontinued, and
the service from this country TO New Zealand is now
performed via England, a longer route, for which
higher postage is required. The first notice We had
of the change, was the sending bsck from New York
of our papers directed 10 New Zealand via San Fran
cisco. They came marked Route discontinued"
Then we had to write to superintendent Blackfan,
to know how our papers could be sent, aud how
many stamps we must afix TO them. No Post Othce
in the country, probably, sends aud receives more
New Zealand matter than the one in this city, but
the Postmaster here has not yet received notice,
except unoficially, through the newspapers, of the
discOutinuance of the route above alluded TO. Mr..
Blackfan has ordered the Postmaster at New York TO
notify the public that letters cannot be sent by way
of San Francisco. How is the Postmaster to notify
the public? He may tell some of the reporters. and
perhaps a reporter for the Associated Press gets hold
OF u III seIuS IL TOuuu. ne may pOSSlDly tlNSIAlSc
in the New York papers. But hundreds Of persons
all over the country have occasion to write letters TO
New Zealand, and they have a right to ask their
village POstmasters what amount of postage Is re-
quired; and if mails are forwarded regularly, they
have q right to ask how often and at what dates;
and we submit that they have q right to get an
answer. But they cannot get q reliable answer at
ten Post Offices out of the thirty thousand in the
country.
1t is nothing more than reasonable that the gov
eminent should publish and supply to every Post
master a schedule giving information of all foreign
rates of postage; and in relation TO the great through
routes, the frequency of mail transmission and the
average time required on the passage should also be
stated. When an important change Is To be made,
the Postmasters should be notified at the earliest
moment by circular.
In the fall OF 1870, one of our papers duly mailed
to one of our subscribers at Cape Verde Islands had
an eventful and wandering history. 1t was prepaid
six cents, and came back in course of time from
London, stamped due l cent" A letter to Wash
cover to the newspaper should be forwarded to Mr..
Blackfan. The cover with newspaper incosed was
forwarded, and Mr.. Blackfan soon replied that he had
forwarded it to London with a request for an expla-
nation, the reply TO which would be duly cOmmuni-
Gated to this Office. AS we have heard nothing
further, it is TO be presumed that the paper was
properly prepaid, and that the. british Office having
no satisfactory explanation to make, did nothing but
forward it to its destination.
Mr.. Blackfan once wrote US in regard to furnish
ing information of changes in foreign postage, that
. such notices are furnished to the several official
postal papers only, of which there were six" So if
the public desires any information relative to foreign
postage, instead of getting it from the Post Office,
(Which we claim is the proper place.) they will find
what they desire in one of the six official postal
papers, so says Mr.. Blackfan.-W. b. Shipping
List, .dpril Sk.