Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1892-02-25

behalf. After a great deal longer de
lay than was experienced in the cas-
of the REGIsTER-perhaps it is easier
to arrive at delinquency in Demo
cratic paper: evil is to be expected
from it, you know-the answer to thi:
inquiry came last Sunday. Here it is
WASHINGTON, d. c., Feb. 10, 1892.
THOMAS BEARD, ESQ, PM. Ironton, Mo
Str-4our letter of the 29th ultimo
addressed to the Postmaster Genera
has just reached my desk with the re-
quest that | reply to it. The letter re
fers to an item in the local columns o.
the Truth, published at Ironton, under
the head of .'Middlebrook, in which
1t is stated that a certain person had
rallied off watch and buggy, and that
certain other persons '.held the mum
Der that drew the watch" etc. You
inquire if this renders that issue of the
paper unavailable under the provisions
of the Lottery Law.
Under strict construction of that
Act the newspaper referred to became
unavailable; but you acted hastily in re-
fusing to admit the paper to the mails
las | learn from another source that you
did), for the reason that it is not the
purpose of this Department to apply
the law harshly to newspapers that
innOcently err against the law. Your
statement that you warned the propri-
etOr before the entire edition was en-
tirely printed is something of justifi-
of pfh n1 a .,
you should have resorted to the tele-
graph, if necessary, in obtaining from
the Department full instructions before
you took that step. Now that the at
tentiOn of the proprietor has been called
to the full scope of the law, you will
please watch his future editions very
closely and hold any issue containing
articles in violation of the law and re-
port them to me by telegraph.
Very respectfully,
JAS. n. TYNER,
Assistant Attorney General.
This is a complete vindication of
Mr.. Boards course in the premises:
except that he ''acted hastily He did
not, in our unenlightened view, even
..act hastily" and the application of a
strict construction of the law in Bro.
Cundiff's case, it seemed to us. couldn't
be termed s.harsh," in view of the full
facts presented. Our brother of the
Truth was fully cognizant of the REG
ISTER'S trouble twelve months before;
he was notified by the postmaster before
he had run off his entire edition that
he the postmaster could not receive
the papers unless the Objectionable
matter was first eliminated-that Off
cial quoting to him the decision in our
the item out of the papers already
printed. But Bro. c., having mind
of his own, swore he'd ..be id if that
item didn't stay in the paper and the
paper would go in the mails" 1t oc-
Cured to us. under the circumstances,
that to Mr.. Beard was only left the OPP
ton of obeying a positive instruction
from Washington or in recognizing
Bro. Cunditf as '.biger man. than
John Wanamaker. And, to tell the
truth, the latter horn of the dilemma
appears to bear the brass knob: for
while the REGISTER was CURLY informed
that its rattle item rendered the paper
and that it must be
clipped out, the same authority in the
perfectly similar case of the Truth
cOoes as gently as a sucking dove to
the too Jealous postmaster: '.you acted
hastily in refusing to admit the papers
to the mails for the reason
that it is not the purpose of this De-
orf,, 70 no lav " TO
that innocently err against
the law" We'd like to know just
what Ito innocently errn means in the
legal vocabulary of the Post Office De-
partment. Its meaning certainly is.
in view of foregoing facts, an unknown
quantity to the ordinary publisher, and
we feel justified in calling for its eluci-
dation into plain, practical, everyday
language. We shall then be extremely
..innocently err" In the meantime,
we congratulate Bro. Cundiff and the
postmaster that both have received Of
fetal endorsement, mixed with Just a
little wholesome corrective warning:
the former not to do so again, and the
latter to restrain his zeal where offend
ers '.innocently err While it is true
that our brother, in a spirit of perhaps
bravado, in the name of
the Liberty of the Press-a played-out
piece of old-fogyism-has republished
the Objectionable item in every issue
since the postmaster told him he
oughtn't, we are sure he will now
drop it, and never again .'innocently