The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1890-02-18
A Postal Telegraph System.

Postmaster General Wanamaker has
outlined to the House committee on post
offices and post roads his plan for the estab-
lishment of a limited postal telegraph sys-
tenn. Mr.. Wanamaker asked the support
of the committee for a bill to invest the
Postmaster General with authority to con-
tract with responsible parties to connect a
certain number of postoffices with each
other by telegraph, by providing wires and
instruments to be operated by postoffice EN-
ployes. He does not propose that the
government shall purchase or build
telegraph lines, but aims at the
utilization of buildings occupied by
the government and employees now
in its service to accommodate the public in
business which, he says, should not ba
divorced from the postoffice, it simply be-
ing the carrying of messages. He holds
that such a service is the legitimate work of
the postoffice department, and that the
demand for telegraph facilities at postal
stations is proper and just one
Mr.. Wanamaker gave the committe figures
showing that in 1S47, when the telegraph
passed from the control of the postof1ice de-
partment, the number of letters mailed was
81, 173, 900; the number of messages trans
mitted by the Western Union Telegraph
Company in the last year was 81, los, 900.
The gross revenue of the postoffice depart
menU in 1871 was $20,637,0O0; the receipts
of the Western Union in the last year we're
$50, 49,, 900
Mr.. Wanamaker pointed out that the
revenues of the postofIice department have
doubled in fifteen years, while the business
and receipts of the Western Union COM
pany have doubled in ten years.
Such system as he proposes would be
self-sustaining, he thinks. OF the telegraph
business of the United States So to 80 per
cent. is commercial and speculative, less
than per cent. being family and social,
while in Great Britain, under the postal
telegraph system of that country, the latter
class of business is more than so per cent.
of the whole The postoffice department is
not self-sustaining, Mr.. Wanamaker says,
because it carries free S. 900 900 to So, 900 900
worth of mail matter of the various de-
| partments of the government and handles
the newspapers of the country for practi-
cally nothing, while the opportunity is al
lowed to pass of transmitting cheap tele-
graphic messages, which he thinks would be
remunerative to the department and an ac-
commodation to the public.
He did not want to be understood by
the committee as saying that his plan
would lessen the business of existing
telegraph companies. The object was
to create q new business. The govern
ment could afford to have telegraph
offices in connection with postal business
where it would not pay a telegraph COM
pany to maintain them, E nployes at such
postal stations could act as operators as well
as clerks, and a class of employees qualified
for the service could be supplied by the
civil service commission.
The details of the Postmaster Generals
plan that have been made public are too
meager to base an opinion upoa IS to the
practicability and utility of so vast an I'M
! deTtaking. The discussion that it will
cause will bring out its merits aud its de-
! fects. 1t is not likely that a matter of so
much magnitude, if acted upon by con-
gress, win be handled without due delibera-
ton. The results which the Postmaster
General thinks would be accomplished by
| his scheme would be beneficial, and the
practicability Of the plan is the man point
to be decided.