The Birmingham age-herald., 1911-02-14
FIGHT AGAINST
 PARCELS POST Convention at Nashville to
 Take Up Matter KICK BY MERCHANTS Southern Business Men Fear the Ef- feet of the Mail Order Business
 Through Establishment
 of Parcels Post

Nashville, February 13.-A list of not able speakers Is being prepared for the convention of southern merchants, which meets in Nashville, February 2S for a four days consideration of the parcels post and other subjects of vital interest to merchants. Among those who are practically certain to come are: Hon. John Sharp Williams of Mississippi, United States senator-elect and dem ocratic leader in the house; T. J. Fernley of Richmond Va, secretary of the National Association of Hardwood Jobbers; Gov. B. ". Hooper of Tennessee; Thomas H. Potts, secretary of the Ma tional Association of Retail Druggists. On the tentative list are Gov. Judson liar mon of Ohio, Gov. Woodrow Wilson of New Jersey, Gen. Luke E. Wright of Memphis Secretary of War in Roosevelts cabinet. formerly governor general of tho Philippines and ambassador to Japan, and a number of others who have at- tained to national prominence in states manship, diplomacy and business en- deavor.
 Concentrated effort Is to be made to render impossible the passage of a parcels post bill. not only at the present term of Congress but at any subsequent term, by demonstrating the eivls 1t would entail on retail merchants, not only, but as well on all interests that in any way touch mercantile enterprises. It Is the belief of those who have brought about the hold ing of q convention that parcels post law, such as that now pending before tbo n,- ties of their capital and population, ag- gravate the evils of centralized wealth and congested cities and that only two classes of interests the retail catalog mall order houses and the express companies, would receive any sort of benefit.
 The theory. of which much capital has been made by certain interests that the passage of the bill now before Congress would result detrmentally to the ex- press companies and that those com panies are preventing Its passage has been exploded. The scheme for rural parcels post. such as the bill calls for. accord
 ing to the contention of the merchants, will not create competition with the ex- press companies, but will give them monopoly of carrying packages from the mail order house to the local postoffice, and the packages will be taken in charge by the mall carriers only after they have reached point where the express com panies can carry them no further.
 The situation that would be created, IS summarized by a member of the execu- tive committee of the convention of south- ern merchants in an interview, follows:
 Tn every country town cataloy agents Of mail order concerns would establish themselves. They would need no store, pay no rent, employ no clerks, require no credit and give none, and carry no stock. Their whole time would be de- voted to soliciting orders from catalogs. The merchandise would be shipped to them by express or freight from the retail mail order houses In the large cities. When received 1t would be deposited in the local postoffice and the packages de- livered by the rural carriers.
 "The rural free delivery system. inauS- urs.ted for the educational advancement of the people, would thus be subverted from it's original purpose, and would be- come mere instrument or agency in the Lands of the great retail mail order cat alog house for the development of the most oppressive trust that human inge- unity could devise--the mail order trust- trust that would ventually control all sources of supply and all channels of dis trsbution for everything the people must cat, wear and use in their daily lives
 No one but the retail mail order cat alog houses, dealing in all classes of merchandise, could maintain local cat alog agent and solicitor in town They would thus be given a monopoly of the commercial advantages of this new system of merchandise delivery by the mail carriers on the rural routes The country merchants would be destroyed b., this competition. They could not meet 1t because they could not afford either to print the eatalog or carry the enor- nous stock necessary to meet the aggres- sive inroads that would be made into their trade field by these local agents and so- licitors for the retail mall order catalog lCuses in the cities
 'The express companies would profit largely by such a system. The depart ment stores in the big cities would absorb the trade of the merchants in suburban towns and villages and would be provid- ed with a daily package delivery system in those places through the rural carriers. They would ship the packages to the local pos stoffice in the suburban town or will lage by express and thus largely increase tho business of the express companies. All packages sent from any other postof- flee to the postoffice where the rural route initiated from which delivery was to be made would have to be sent to that postoffice by express. This would further increase the profits of the express com psnies from the system. No competition with express rates would be created. The scheme for a local rural parcels post be- gins where competition with the express companies ends. It loads all the compe- tition on to the backs of the country merchants and the retail tradesmen in the suburban towns and villages.
 "A local rural parcels post would heav- ily increase the postal deficit. All rural carriers who are now equipped only for the rapid delivery of mail would have to be equipped with facilities for carrying