Daily tobacco leaf-chronicle. (Clarksville, Tenn.) 1890-1895, 1891-02-05
cAgAe POSTAGE foa CHEAP BOOKS.
The Discrimination Severely Arraigned

CHEAP POSTAGE FOR CHEAP BOOKS.
The Determination Severely Arraignod
by the Librarian of Congress.
WASHINGTON, Feb. 5.-Hon. A. r.
Spofford, the librarian of congress, who
is a recognized authority upon any sub
ject with which he attempts to deal, has
contributed very interesting statement
to the pending discussion in congress
over the tendency of low rates in the
mails for cheap books. He says that
these rates mean the widest circulation
for the poorest literature. The Post, Of
this city, publishes the following letter
from Mr.. Spoaord:
EDITOR PosT-An article under the head
of "Cheap Postage for Cheap Books, " in
Mondays Post, questions Senator
Reagan's statement that ''yellow COW
cred novels are carried in the mails
at one cent pound, while other
books including the Bible, are charged
eight times as much. Your well known
fairness implies me to state some facts of
vital Importance in this matter. The
correction is right, 50 far as mailing books
by private individuals is concerned, all
literature being cha gsd the uniform rate
of eight cents mot 1oLr cents) pound for
postage. But this is by no means the
whole case. The publishers and news
agencies can send the cheap libraries, cali
ing themselves periodicals, in unlimited
quantities by mail at only one cent
pound, while neither publishers, book
dealers, editors, Librarians nor anybody
else can send or receive any other books
without paying eight cents pound post
age.
What results Simply that the govern
ment fosters the widest circulation for
the poorest literature. 1t discriminates
against tho useful and the instructive in
favor Of the entertaining, the amusing
and otentimes the debasing class of fic-
tions. OF course there is no sense in the
proposition to exclude these books from
the m ills. No censorship is possible in
this country, even were it desirable. But
there is still less sense, and no justice in
endowing them with special privilege, to
be shipped broadcast over the land Mt
merely nominal postage, at the expense Of
the Taxpayers VINO must pay not only the
$lCO0,000 estimated by the postoilice de-
partment as the eXJra cost of carriage, but
must always pay eight times as much for
all the other books which the people want
by mail
A 81 lecal privilege can be defended only
upon one ground namely, that it works
benefit to the community. Is the wide
diffusion OF these cheap libraries such
benefit as to justly this discrimination in
their favor, with he consequent burden
on the taxpayer? What are these books
thus favored by our pateInal governm mt
In tie Lowell library, out OF JAP pub.ica-
tions 1,t3l are works of fiction, and OILY
Ill are Looks of history, biography etc,
In. the Seaside library a still greater pro
portion OF fiction IS found, and out OF ? $50
Seaside books 20J5 are by foreign authors,
only seYenty-hve being written by Ameri-
cans. From S5 to So per cent. of these
widely disseminated volumes are not only
novels, but foreig novels.
Ii buy Professor Langleys "New As
tronomy" in New York / must paytwenty-
eight cents TO get it to Washington by
mail; but | can receive 100 volumes of tie
trash of Zola or Ouida lOr twenty-eight
cents postage, because the government
charges just eight times as much to carry
improving literature as for the opposite.
Books of science, religion and Literature
are thus disfavored, and the advocates OF
"cheap postage for cheap books" call this
popular education. 1t is educating the
people in a morbid appetite for fiction,
educating them in foreign ideas instead OF
American ones, educating them in aristoc-
racy in place OF republican democracy, edu-
eating them in a taste Tor the unwholc-
some brood of novels, instead of the works
of the great masters of thought,
But we are told these libraries difluse
Farrars Life of Christ" Carlisles rs
saysand even the Scriptures in cheap form.
They did reprint the revised Bible, which
nobody reads, because it was of the nature
of news when it was published. But whap
are a dozen or two of good and useful
books in tie midst of thousands OF
volumes of ephemeral trash? | do not
wish to push an indiscriminate argument
against novels. There are few influences
more powerful for good than a really good
novel, but 1t is also true that there ale none
more powerful for mischief than a bad
one. / am bound to add Il u of late yeals,
under the stimulus of low prices and
cheapness of freight before unheard o..
there has been a marvellous crop of bad
ones.
Ine competition is so sharp that they
cannot find a sufficient market for the
comparatively few good works, and SO, in
stead of drawing from the pure well of
English undehled,' they flood the country
with this modern stuff translated from
the French, which is very far from being
either pure CT undefiled.
The facts are that this special privilege
of the cLeap Libraries is indetensible, save
upon the poor ground that it already ex-
lists. The fishing bounty monopoly was
delened on the same ground, but it had
to 20. A. X. SPoFFoRD
COST OF THE INDIAN CAMPAIGN.
In Round Numbers Uncle Sam is Out of