The foregoing presentation of facts has shown that there are no sufficient grounds for destroying the value of the investments of the people in existing telegraph companies by governmental competition, the telegraph system of this country being unrivalled in its extent, unequalled in its administration, and unparalleled for the low rates which it has always maintained.

In this country the people have not been accustomed to rely upon the government to provide those things for them which they are able to secure by their own exertions. If this principle is right in regard to one enterprise, it is also in relation to all others; and if infringed upon in the case of the telegraph companies, what pursuit will be safe from governmental interference?

It is undoubtedly true that, were tariffs designed simply to provide a revenue to support the lines, they are capable of reduction, provided present arrangements with railroad companies and others could be maintained, by which the labor of the one is utilized in the service of the other. But for this the country makes no demand. It recognizes the telegraph as a legitimate enterprise for the investment of the capital and labor of its citizens. If false counsels guide its development, public reprobation is ready with its remedy. Its absorption by government would not only be a public calamity, but a breach of the theory and spirit of our institutions, and would soon result in its necessary return to individual control.

POLITICAL REASONS WHY GOVERNMENT SHOULD NOT CONTROL THE TELEGRAPH.

One of the most serious objections to the government of the United States assuming the control of the telegraph is the political one. In monarchical countries, where the sovereignty is a patrimony of a particular family, and where no change is made except by revolution, everything which tends towards the permanence of the reigning dynasty is looked upon as in the interest of law and order, and for these reasons the absorption of the telegraphs by the government is regarded as a proper and legitimate act, and consistent with the public weal; but in a republic, where the rulers are changed periodically, and where the purity of the elections is of the first importance, the placing of so great a power in the hands of the government would be a public calamity. It might be supposed that rulers could be elected who would not take advantage of the control of the telegraph for selfish purposes, but the temptation to do so would be great, and, even if not yielded to, the suspicions of the people would be constantly aroused, and confidence in its impartial administration would be destroyed. In every election the whole army of postmasters and the machinery of the department is enlisted in the service of the party in power. Shall we give it the telegraph also? What would be the influence on election returns?

The censorship of telegraphic correspondence, always a subject of public disapprobation, is generally exercised by all governments which have its management. In France the control of the telegraph by government is loudly complained of, in consequence of notorious abuses which result from it. Amongst other things, it is well known that the authorities of the Bourse, in Paris, have opportunities of seeing every telegram which reaches or leaves that city on matters relating to the stock exchange operations.

THE POST-OFFICE DEPARTMENT NOT COMPETENT TO MANAGE THE TELEGRAPHS.

If it should ever appear to be for the public good that this agency, so capable of use as a political power, should pass into the hands of government, it seems proper to await such a demonstration of the self-sustaining capacity of the department under whose control it is proposed to be placed, and such efficiency in that service, as will furnish reasonable assurance of ability for the united control without burden to the state, or lessened convenience to the people. A department which is still confessedly imperfect, which cannot even tell the number of letters which it transmits per annum, whose receipts are unequal to the cost of service by over $6,000,000,^[28] which could not secure skilled labor in this new field except by foraging from existing enterprises, and which could not avoid heavy losses at the rates proposed, is not at present a fit recipient of so important a trust.

The Post-Office Department, which already has more duties than it is able to perform, instead of seeking to absorb the telegraphs, had better apply itself to its proper task of developing the correspondence of the country, and endeavor to make itself financially profitable to the nation, instead of a serious burden.

That the post-office undertakes more than it can perform is shown by the delays and irregularities of the service, and the enormous and constantly increasing number of its dead letters, which amounted, in 1867, to over 4,500,000! Were the telegraph companies to deal with the messages committed to them for transmission as the post-office deals with the letters committed to its care, there would be good grounds for governmental interference; but there are very few complaints of non-delivery of telegrams.

It should be borne in mind that electric telegraphy is a science, and its successful operation requires a thorough knowledge of electricity, skill in manipulating the apparatus, and many years of constant training in the practical duties of the business. Many of the employees of this company have been constantly in the service for more than a score of years, and still consider themselves students in this new field of practical science: without wishing to be invidious in our comparisons, we may fairly say that the intelligence and skill which are ample for the duties of filling a bag with letters and despatching them by horse or steam power, would not be competent to the duties of successfully transmitting an important despatch through the invisible agency of the electric current.

Another serious drawback to the value of the telegraph under government management is its failure to make reparation to private individuals for losses caused by the errors or imperfection of its service. In no country where the telegraph exists under government control is there any assumption of accountability for errors or delays in the transmission of messages. In some countries they will not even inquire into the cause of delay or errors, and in others, as in Spain, they will only do so for the purpose of punishing the delinquent employee, but in no case to reimburse the patron of the telegraph for his loss. This failure to assume any responsibility in the matter is of great importance to the public. The amount paid by the Western Union Telegraph Company per annum, on account of these unavoidable errors and delays, is very considerable. The public would be reluctant to leave the correct transmission and delivery of their important messages to the chances of a government system which is notoriously defective, and which would in no case reimburse them for losses occasioned by errors in the transmission of their telegrams, or failure to send them at all. The scheme proposed by Mr. Hubbard, owing to the divided responsibility of the service, would be even worse than the absorption of the lines by the government. Public opinion could not reach the contractor, because he is the servant of the government, and not of the public, and it would fail to influence the Post-Office Department, as it does not itself perform the service, and, because being a department, it is practically irresponsible. How much influence, for example, has public opinion on the collectors of internal revenue or customs, or even the postmasters of this country?

If despatches were left at the post-offices, or dropped in the street boxes, as provided for in Mr. Hubbard’s bill, they would have to take their chances of transmission and delivery, with no recourse, in case of failure, for redress from any source. If a despatch should fail to reach its destination, and complaint was made to the postmaster, he would reply that he was not responsible for its transmission, and would refer the aggrieved person to the telegraph contractor; while the latter would answer that he was a servant of the government, and not responsible to the public for the imperfections of his service. And the result would be, that while the sender of the despatch obtained no redress, he would not have even the satisfaction of knowing which service was at fault, the post-office or the telegraph.

The proposition to erect a competitive governmental telegraph line between Washington and New York, as described in the paper of Mr. Washburne, and the bill designed to authorize it, is a scheme founded upon no public necessity, unjust and delusive.

It is easily demonstrable that the tariff proposed by the bill, if adopted by the government, could only be maintained by large drafts upon the national treasury. It is well known that the active hours of telegraph service are about five, and the ordinary average of transmission not over fifty messages per hour, the general allowance being forty. Thus each of the four wires proposed to be erected under the bill would be capable of earning, at the maximum, five dollars per hour, or a total daily income of one hundred dollars, an amount unequal to the provision of the most ordinary indoor service, to say nothing of the cost of management, repairs of lines, battery power, stationery, and many other necessary expenses. The annual cost to our company of repairs and inspection on this route alone is $20,000.

This company denies the exorbitance of the rates it has adopted, and which it is now actively engaged in modifying so as to secure the fairest correspondence to other branches of labor, and the utmost development of the system. It therefore deprecates as illusory, as well as unjust, the proposal to establish rates lower than those which in Belgium have caused a loss of one third of the tariff on each message sent, and which, under the management of a department now showing an enormous annual deficit, cannot fail to prove perplexing and disastrous. It deprecates also, as utterly illusory, the idea that under such tariffs a product would be realized that would provide for the extension of the government lines to other regions. This delusion, which makes it possible for an intelligent public man to predicate so absurd a result, has for a basis that which is ever used to allure men into schemes of promised wealth. The insane speculation which, thirty years ago, ruined tens of thousands of our people, by counting the leaves of the Morus multicaulis as the products of veritable mulberry-trees, on which delighted caterpillars would feed, and enrich their owners with untold webs of native silk, was not more illusory than that which to-day, by showing the possibilities of each hour by day and night, crams the wires with possible messages which will never be sent, and estimates balances which cannot be earned.

This scheme would be unjust to government, by undermining and perilling a business which pays $300,000 per annum to its revenues, besides casting upon a nation, great because of the energy which has characterized its private enterprises, the odium of initiating competition with one of the most useful products of the national brain, before time has been given to complete the design of those who direct it, and to fully illustrate its capacity.

The policy and practice of the Western Union Telegraph Company favor a reduction of the rates on despatches as rapidly as the necessary expenses of the service will admit; and if the government will abolish its tax on the receipts for transmitting telegrams, this company will immediately lower its rates until the reduction upon the gross amount of business done shall be twice as much as the tax remitted.

This would lessen the rates for telegraphing nearly ten per cent, and would be a far better plan for furnishing cheaper telegraphic facilities to the people than the construction and operation of government lines at the expense of the national treasury.