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Untitled Article
le-grand would become a mountain of copper , and that it would be impossible to contrive any means by which the money might be counted , and removed . A pennv stamp is asserted to be the only way of getting out of the dilemma . But mark the dishonesty of the whole proposition . It is proposed not merely
to stamp every newspaper requiring to be sent through the post-office , but also to stamp newspapers having an exclusively local circulation . If cheap local newspapers could be published , they would be generally preferred by country readers to London journals , two-thirds of which are always filled with advertisements , puff paragraphs , critiques upon theatres , and other matters of no interest to any person
not resident in town . But no , says the Chancellor of the Exchequer , every newspaper reader in Manchester or Liverpool , whether he wishes it or not , shall be compelled to purchase London newspapers , or what is equivalent to the same thing , shall pay a tax , and a heavy tax too , for having them conveyed to other persons . Again : a large proportion
of the London papers are now regularly sent off by the morning coaches as soon as published . The county papers are chiefly circulated by means of butchers , bakers , and other tradesmen , who make periodical visits to the villages , and gentlemen ' s seats . In other cases county newspapers are charged with a cross-country postage of a penny , which would continue to be
levied . These are all instances in which it is unjust to inflict a penny stamp duty , under the pretence of giving the public In return the accommodation of the post-office . The obvious course would be to let those pay for the accommodation who require it , or to bestow it gratis , which is the more liberal policy of other countries with respect to various literary and scientific publications .
It is worth while to see whether the profit to be derived from a penny postage would pay the expenses , if it should be necessary , of a few additional mail coaches , and new receiving houses . The mail coaches now charge at the rate of lid . per pound
for large parcels , carried one hundred miles . A parcel of one thousand newspapers weighing SS pounds would therefore cost 1 is . The maximum cost of collecting , and distributing them by hand , would be 9 s . A postage of one penny , or of 4 / . 3 s . 4 a .
the thousand , would , therefore , leave a profit of 31 . 3 s . Ad . As there are now about twenty-five millions of newspapers circulated by the Post-Office , every time the business of the newspaper department was doubled , with a penny postage , there would be a profit to Government , over and above all
expenses , of 7 ?) , l ( iO 7 . 13 s . 4 d . It is disgraceful to our Legislature that it should be necessary to reiterate these facts . The example of America and
Untitled Article
Moral Interests of the Productive Classes . 4 ffej
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), April 2, 1836, page 263, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2656/page/71/
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