The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1915-04-21
WOULD POSTAL|E
THE TELEPHONE
Burleson is Not First to Advocate
The Idea.
BY BURTON X. STANDISH.
Written for the United Press)

sentatives wishes to know about pos
tai affairs, wishes to bolster up an
impending speech with few facts,
and hasn't time to get in touch with
the Post Office Department, he has
always the alternative of asking:
Rep. David J.. Lewis, Of Maryland.
Lewis is a simple and SUR remedy
for ignorance concerning the post
Office, if taken in time and sufficient
doses. He is as full of information
regarding the mails as Representa-
tive James R. Mann is regarding
parliamentary precedents or Senator
Lafollette regarding the railroads.
Right off the bat he could tell you
if you wanted to know, how much it
would cost you to send a dozen China
eggs from your home in Blueield to
your aunt in Billings, Mont, and if
you asked further, he'd tell you just
how much profit the government
made on the shipment and how much
the railroad made.
Congressman Lewis is a great be-
lever in the possibilities of the post
Office and his present pet idea is the
postalization of the telephone, and
telegraph. Commenting on the advo-
cacy of this move by Postmaster
Burleson, he said the other day.
"Mr. Burleson's predecessors for
so years have given like counsel.
The principal countries of the world,
the United States alone excepted,
have already postalized these .agen-
cies. Why? Briefly, because the
postofics alone has the motive and
the facilities to make rates low en-
ough to render service to all the
people. Before the parcels post we
had the highest parcel rates. They
are now among the lowest in the
world. We still have the highest
telegraph rates. They III from Is
cents to ST.. Where the post OIL
ducts the telegraph they run from
10 cents to "a cents for the longest
distances.
"The result of our high rates is
that we use the telegraph little. New
Zealand with a 12-cent rate shows 9
telegraph per capita, the United
States only l.. But with the lowest
letter rates we show the highest use,
101 letters per capita, as against SO
for New Zealand. While our tele-
graph rates run from two to over
four times as high as countries like
Australia, with distances as long
and wages as high as our own, our
toll or long distance rates are even
more immoderate. They run from
three to seven times as high as the
postal telephone tates of other coun-
tries.
"The average rate for 100 miles
in nine countries of Europe is 20
cents as against so cents here; for
800 miles, 81 cents, as against $3.50
here; for 400 miles, 80 cents as
against s2.4O; for 500 miles, 46
cents, as against So; for 700 miles,
So cents, as against s4.2O.
"That is to say, for 100 miles we
pay three times as much as they in
Europe and for 700 miles, we pay
eight times as much.
1T costs the American as much
to ship his long-distance c~onversa-
ton over the wires as it. costs him
to ship mis- freight over the rails.
The railroads get on an average 7
mills a mile for moving a ton of
freight. The charge for carrying
three-minute conversation a mile is
6 mills. Conversations weigh about
a ton on the long distance wires.
"The effect of the rates is to re-
duce the traffic to a point as abaor-
mally low as the rates are abnormal
ly high. Combining kilograms and
telephone messages we find that
other countries use the wire from
two to four times as much as we.
Denmark shows II such messages
per capita-we show only three. We
rank first in the use of the letter,
but thirteenth in the use of the wire.
Moreover, our companies maintain
but one telegraph Office to every sew
M ooet ofEoos Tho noofo1 incIit,r-