The times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1897-1901, 1900-12-17
MEA9SSENPIN THE MAILS
Germany Asserts Violations Of Her
Fork Exclusion Act.
= americans Forwarding SnusaGe to
Friends in Fathcrlnnd-Minin
Mcnagcracs Found in Postal
Snt.heisa-A Pigs Tail In Pack
agc-Sumcrous Trials of the Clerks

| The notice sent from the PostOfiice De-
| partment here to postmasters all over the
| country that Germany had refused longer
to accept Theoretically sealed cans and
| similar reccptacles packed with sausaSes
or other mixtures of chopped meat arriving
in the International mails was probably
the first intimation conveyed to a large
par: of the American public that such
! things as sausases and chopped meat were
ever sent through the postoftice.
The Universal Postal Union makes
some rather liberal provisions for the con-
! veyance of samples of merchandise through
the international mails, regulating such
| traffic merely by certain restrictions on
the manner in which the samples shall be
enclosed, but, unfortunately. there are
merchants in all countries who are dis
posed TO take improper advantage OF their
privileges. 1t is doubtless this tendency
! which will be used by Germany as pre-
| text for her order of exclusion, even
though the order were actually adopted as
| a measure OF industrial protection at the
| instance of the domestic meatpackers and
| sausasemakers. Germany has rather Sc
| we're laws regarding the inpection OF i'm
| ported meats. These are easy to execute
where the importations occur in the usual
| quantities and by the usual routes, but
hard to enforce against importations by
| mail. though the harm done by impure
| meat products brought into the country in
| small quantities and distributed through
| the postofiice might be just as bad as il
| they had been packed in large quantities
| and slowed independently in the hold of
| a ship. One of the latest concessions made
| by the Universal Postal Union was in per-
| uniting samples of articles composed of
| glass or other fragile substances to be
| mailed in unsealed packages. provided
| these DO not exceed certain size and
| weight and are so packed as to preclude
the possibility OF injury to the postal en-
ployes or to the correspondence in the
same pouches in case of wreckage.
1t requires considerable exchange of
formalities between the various powers to
make either a concession or restriction
affecting the international mails. In our
domestic mails. naturally. the matter is
much simpler. There is wide dscre-
tion allowed to the Postmaster General in
directing what kinds of matter are mail
able and what unavailable, and after he
has formulated any general rule each
postmaster is invested with certain re-
sponsibility in constituting it and deciding
what falls within the prohibited class.
Now and then Congress takes a hand in
the business and enacts a law either spe-
officially denying to certain objects the
mailing privilege or authorizing the Post
master General to make prohibitory rules
and regulations in some new direction.
Frauds and IMMORAL reading matter are
among the subjects which give the Post
office Department most trouble. 1t is
sometimes hard to draw line between
what is strictly legitimate business and
what Is a catch-penny device. An adver
tier who offers to mail merchandise on
receipt of SO much money and who pockets
the money, is easy game, but one who
lives UP to the letter of his advertisement.
even though playing TO some extent upon
public credulity, is a little harder to con-
Wet Such was the case OF a dealer dur
ing the civil war. who advertised to fur
nish for % cents fine steel engraving.
printed in colors, of a medallion of the
head of George Washington or of Benja-
min Franklin, OF which large quantities
had been ordered for the use of the United
States Government. He did thriving
business until it was discovered that the
purchasers received for their money one
of the two cheapest denominations of
postage stamps.
Live animals were excluded from the
mails n long time ago. Because eccentric
persons insisted upon sending snakes and
squirrels and rats to each other. with oc
casionally u tarantula thrown in, and the
unfortunate clerks who sorted the mails
suffered in consequence. But by and by
the apiarists, numerically strong body in
this country, induced the Government to |
make an exception in favor of queen bees,
il put up in boxes of a certain quality. J
The same exception was made at later |
date in the favor of ladybirds, brought |
here from Australia. because of their use |
fulness in destroying scale insects on !
plants. The question, What is a lottery ad- |
yertisement has been raised many times |
since the anti-lottery laws were enacted, |
the managers of various gift enterprises |
having trodden dangerously close to the |
line defining lottery, if they had not !
actually transgregseG it. In such matters
as in the case Of immoral literature. a
local postmaster is often put to his wits
end and has to appel to the department |
at Washington. Another difficulty, with
an incidental incongruty. arises now and |
then under the rule which forbids post
office employees to read postal cards. and
those which forbida the mails to cards
containing scurrilous or libelous matter.
How any employe is going to discover the
libelous or scurrilous contents of postal
card unless he breaks the rule against |
reading il raises an interesting technical
ity OF course. the law making such
cards unavailable is intended TO furnish
ground for penalty against the writer of
the card; at the same time, a case rarely
comes up under this -rovision without get
ting some postmast, or clerk into more |
or less trouble. person, by the way |
who is bound to libel another or insult
him by mail, may not always use either a
card or n letter.
number OF years ago someone placed
in country postofIice in Pennsylvania
package which when opened by the adj
dressee proved to contain nothing but
pigs tail. Beyond the fact that it was
perishable matter. liable to become Il null
sance and injure other packages and cor
the postmaster would have
had no visible cause to throw the package
out. even If he had known its contents.
He probably would not have reasoned that
it conveyed any libelous suggestion, but
the recipient applied in high dudgcon to
the department In Washington. declaring
that the sender of the package had by i'm
putation called him a liar. There was
for the department TO do but in
vestigate, and this it did ut considerable
expense. but without any ultimate salts
faction.
The question of the ma!lable or IN
mailablo character of certain matter call
ed seditious has been raised even wi hin
the last eighteen months. when me
pamphlets were thrown out of the me- lis
on the ground that they were calculated
TO spread unpatriotic doctrine among he
soldiers of the United States in the colo
MICS Incidentally TO this case ii was re-
called that in 1925 and thcreabout it was
no uncommon thing to have anjl-slavery
literature taken from the mails and burn
hot Ia fsity 10 |