The daily morning journal and courier., 1901-05-23
MONEY WITHOUT AN OWNER.


 What becomes of all the money or ders which are never presented for pay
 ment?' asked a Washington business
 man of postal official. Every few
 days we receive letters from our custo-
 mers saying that they have forwarded
 orders for goods, but the orders have
 nered reached our hands. And this is
 true of very large mail order in
 Washing tom
 They disappear in various ways" 7" was the reply Some are burned or torn up instead of the receipts and this
 is particularly true of International money orders where the receipts are of
 he same size of the order, only white in color. Some are sent in letters which
 are not addressed at all or are incor- rectly addressed and these, together with thousands of other orders, find
 their way to the dead letter office. Ul-
 timately most of these letters find their
 way back to the remitters orduplicates
 are applied for
 "The British government utilizes as Ia source of postal revenue all of the
 money in its hands which is not paid
 out to meet money orders upon presen-
 tation and derives about fifty thousand
 dollars annually therefrom. Our gov ernment does not attempt to derive any profit from this source and the money
 is turned into the treasury where it Is held in trust, as it were. to meet these obl gations. The government has no de- sire to claim or confiscate this money, r,iI1 ttc aI, In, ho form of money order at any time upon presentation upon satisfying itself in the instance of a long lapse of years that there has been no previous pay ment by duplicate or otherwise. In Great Britain, believe this money be- comes forfeited to the government after a certain number of years, four, think. The British government evidently pro- ceeds upon the theory that if holder of a money order or the sender does not seek to cash the order within reasona- ble time the government can put 1t to good advantage by applying the amount to it's own use. Such practice un- facilitates the business of the end of the contract and is legal if authorized by law. In nearly all money transactions there is a limitation upon the validity of any voucher which represents cash as to it's Even note payable without date is barred by the statute of in the various states.
 There Is to-day an accumulation of over $2500,000 in the treasury of these | unclaimed money orders which has | been gradually pilng up year after yea turing the thirty-five years the govern nent has been conducting a money or Ter business With each individual or Ter the government has made a special ,ffort to effect payment to the payee or estore the amount to the remitter. and, ailing, can do nought but keep the mount. The fact that fifty thousand duplicate orders are annually issued would appear to indicate that the Amer can people are extremely careless in the of these money vouchers. Where the originals go or how they are disposed of would fill volume.
 "The government has issued for bll- ion dollars in money orders and has aid every cent of this great sum ex- ept the $2,500000 have mentioned. A ingle order may be issued up to one undred dollars in amount, and the {, verage is about S750, the smaller of- ces issuing the great bulk of orders nd the larger offices cashing 95 per ent of them.
 Tray cling men, actors, circus men. , ailrcad employees and others, whose , usiness requires them to move from :, lace to place. are very often fond of uying orders payoble to themselves. hey cannot spend an order as bill nd as no one bit themselves or the in- orsees may secure the amount of the 1. 'ders they are just that much ahead ,, hen they get into the next town, mak- : g themselves their own bankers with 4 le government as a depository. Some I mes an actor or circus man will pre- mt a dozen orders at the close of the A ason which he has bought from time
 time, and their amount represents wings which otherwise would have zen spent Washington Star.