CONGRESS, UNITED STATES. 



139 



to be considered by the committee, and a re- 

 port made on it." 



Mr. Logan : " A matter of this kind certainly 

 every Senator in the Chamber is just as familiar 

 with as the Committee on Post-Offices and Post- 

 Eoads. This is a mere resolution authorizing 

 Senators and Representatives and Delegates to 

 frank official letters sent to their constituents 

 by them. That is what it embraces. How can 

 the committee give any more information on 

 it than there is in the resolution ? " 



Mr. Davis, of West Virginia : "I appeal to 

 the Senator to allow the reference to be made ; 

 but if he prefers not, I reckon we had just 

 as well take a test vote on it, and therefore 

 I move that the joint resolution be referred 

 to the Committee on Post-Offices and Post- 

 Roads." 



Mr. Logan : " I move, as an amendment to 

 that motion, that the committee be instructed 

 to report back immediately." 



Mr. Conkling, of New York : "I have no 

 objection to a reference of this resolution to 

 the Committee on Post-Offices and Post-Roads ; 

 but if it is to be referred I agree with the Sen- 

 ator from Illinois that it should be with a di- 

 rection of the Senate that it shall come back 

 presently, a direction which I can not doubt 

 is proper ; and I say that for this reason : the 

 whole question is whether we want the legis- 

 lation of Congress to so continue that every 

 clerk in a post-office, every clerk in a depart- 

 ment from the head clerk of that department 

 down, may send through the mails matters of 

 public business, while at the same time the 

 members of this body and of the House of Rep- 

 resentatives shall be compelled to defray each 

 from his own pocket the great volume of post- 

 age which is borne upon communications coin- 

 ing from the soldiers, the sailors, the widows, 

 the beneficiaries under the pension acts, and 

 other persons who send letters not touching 

 our business but their business. That is the 

 whole question." 



Mr. Edmunds, of Vermont: "I think that 

 the idea in a republic like ours that the rep- 

 resentatives of the people are to be taxed 

 for communicating with them about any mat- 

 ter of public concern, whether you call it 

 official business or political business, is wrong. 

 I believe the more yon can encourage the 

 people by carrying their letters and commu- 

 nications to members of Congress from and 

 upon all possible subjects, the more good you 

 do to republican government and the dissem- 

 ination of intelligence upon which it rests. 

 Therefore I have always voted against the 

 abolition of the franking privilege, so called, 

 and always voted in favor of its restoration, 

 and I mean to do it again. We all under- 

 stand how this notion of abolishing it got up. 

 A few great city papers started it because they 

 thought they would increase their circulation 

 by cutting off as far as possible communication 

 between Members and Senators at the capital 

 and distant parts of the country ; and it is a 



strange thing, as the Senator from New York 

 has said, that year after year by our own laws 

 we have declared that the only public servants 

 not fit to be trusted in communicating with 

 the people about public affairs are Senators and 

 Representatives. A head of department, any 

 of the department clerks, everybody in the 

 executive service of the country is thought 

 worthy to be trusted to communicate concern- 

 ing public affairs with everybody else through 

 the advantage of the mails, it costing the United 

 States nothing to carry the free communica- 

 tions except on a very few routes. It is true 

 that the postage that you would force Senators 

 and Members and citizens to pay, and which 

 otherwise they would not pay, is so much loss 

 to the accumulated taxation of the people. 

 That is true ; but I think that every cent that 

 you lose in allowing a citizen to send to any 

 Senator a letter on any subject of public con- 

 cern and we all know that ninety-nine hun- 

 dredths of these letters are about subjects of 

 public concern is ten thotisand times counter- 

 balanced by the advantage that there is to a 

 country constituted like ours in this absolutely 

 free intercommunication. Therefore I am not 

 afraid of the opinions of my constituents or 

 anybody else on such a subject. The present 

 course of procedure is very unjust to Senators 

 and Members. Every chairman of a committee 

 in respect of the absolute performance of his 

 duties is taxed day by day. When I had the 

 honor to be chairman of the Committee on the 

 Judiciary, I found that I was taxed to the ex- 

 tent of several dollars a week, and I have no 

 doubt my friend from Ohio [Mr. Thurman] is 

 now to a large sum, in paying postage in re- 

 spect to matters that we had no more indi- 

 vidual concern in than a resident of France, but 

 that the public had concern in. I am in favor 

 of this reference and for an immediate report, 

 in order that the committee may consider 

 whether they shall not extend this right I 

 would not call it a privilege ; rather a right and 

 a duty to all the correspondents of Senators 

 and members of Congress; or if they think 

 it unfit to do that, to be careful to define the 

 word 'official' in some way, so that wo can 

 honorably and honestly understand it all alike 

 as to what is covered by what is called * offi- 

 cial business ' of Senators. I do not know pre- 

 cisely what that would mean." 



Mr. Eaton, of Connecticut : " Mr. President, I 

 have no doubt about the propriety of this reso- 

 lution. I have been paying postage, as my friend 

 from Vermont says he has been. I have done 

 it to-day and every other day, as well as I can 

 remember, for a long time past ; but after the 

 remarks which have been made here, is there 

 any necessity to instruct the committee? In 

 my judgment the committee will report as 

 speedily as possible." 



Mr. Thurman, of Ohio : " Mr. President, I 

 have a little delicacy in speaking on this sub- 

 ject. My political life is so nearly at an end 

 that it might be supposed I was interfering 



