Canada: Its Postage Stamps and Postal Stationery Part 15

1859 1638 13,871 8,500,000 678,426.98

1860 1698 14,202 9,000,000 658,451.99 {Additional 2c. rate { on unpaid letters { and charge { made on newspapers.

The Report continues:--

From the experience of the past, the confident hope may be entertained that, by a wise and judicious economy, (and without withholding from newly settled portions of the country, the Postal accommodations without which the settlement of the country cannot advance), in a comparatively short s.p.a.ce of time the Postage upon letters may be reduced from the present five cent to a _three cent rate_, as near an approach to the Penny sterling postage system of the Mother Country as the relative value of our currency will conveniently permit.

It was eight years before these hopes were realized, however.

The "epistolary intercourse with the United States" is given for the same period, but we need only note that the postal value of the total correspondence exchanged was $83,630.97 in 1852, had increased to $187,469.59 in 1857, and then dropped gradually to $178,132.39 in 1860.

The Report says:--

The prepayment of letters pa.s.sing between the two countries continues optional on either side, at the combined rate of 10 cents per 1/2 oz. from any place in Canada to any place in the United States and _vice versa_, except to or from the States on the Pacific, California and Oregon, when the rate is 15 cents per 1/2 oz.

The accounts present a charge in favor of the American Bank Note Co. of $1697.95 "for engraving Letter and Newspaper stamps and Stamped Envelopes." Of the latter we shall have more to say in their proper place.

The Reports of 1861 and 1862 contain nothing special, and the accounts show payments of $1451.87 and $1583.63 respectively to the American Bank Note Co.

The Report of 1863 states that in November of that year an agreement was entered into with the United States for the transmission between the two countries of seeds, bulbs, etc., at 1 cent per ounce, and also book ma.n.u.scripts, printers' proof sheets, maps, prints, etc., at the same rate.

In January 1864, the Imperial Post Office extended to the mails between Canada and the United Kingdom regulations conceding patterns of merchandise and trade samples at the same rates as books and printed matter.

The American Bank Note Co. was paid $1946.62.

The next Report is dated 30th June, 1864, instead of the usual 30th September, and is therefore for nine months only. This was done to bring the fiscal year of the Post Office Department to correspond with the financial year of the General Government.

The enactment which was the cause of the change follows:--

27^o--28^o Vict. Cap. VI.

An Act to amend the Law respecting the Public Accounts, and the Board of Audit.

(_a.s.sented to 30th June, 1864_)

10. It shall be the duty of the Board of Audit to prepare and submit to the Minister of Finance the Public Accounts to be annually laid before Parliament.

11. The said Public Accounts shall include the period from the thirtieth of June in one year to the thirtieth of June in the next year, which period shall const.i.tute the Financial Year....

There is nothing particular in the Report for these nine months to quote here, except the payment of the relatively small sum of $619.25 to the American Bank Note Co.

The Report for 1865 states that "Regulations have been adopted establis.h.i.+ng a sample and pattern post in Canada, and packets of trade samples, or patterns of merchandise, may be sent by post between any places within this Province, on prepayment of one cent per ounce, under certain conditions to prevent an abuse of the privilege." It further announces that "Street Letter boxes are being placed in all the princ.i.p.al streets of Montreal."

The Reports of 1866 and 1867 were published together, but contain little of interest beyond the statistics we have already used. Payments to the American Bank Note Co. were $2630.11 in 1866 and $1699.03 in 1867. The final payment to the American Co., which we have already quoted from the 1868 report, was $1331.70. We read that "The street letter boxes put up in the city of Montreal have worked satisfactorily. The number of letters and papers posted therein weekly, appeared from returns taken to be, Letters 2400, Papers 500, or at the rate of 150,000 letters and papers per annum."

Authority to establish letter boxes was given by an Act of Parliament which contains several other matters of interest and which we therefore quote.

29^o--30^o Vict. Cap. XI.

An Act to amend the Post Office Act.

[_a.s.sented to 15th August, 1866._]

Whereas the more effectually to prevent frauds upon the Post Office Revenue, it is expedient to amend the Post Office Act: Therefore, Her Majesty, by and with the consent of the Legislative Council and a.s.sembly of Canada, enacts as follows:

1. If any person uses or attempts to use in payment of postage on any letter or mailable thing posted in this Province, any postage stamp which has been before used for a like purpose, such person shall be subjected to a penalty of not less than Ten and not exceeding Forty dollars for every such offense, and the letter or other mailable thing on which such stamp has been so improperly used may be detained, or in the discretion of the Postmaster General forwarded to its destination charged with double the postage to which it would have been liable if posted unpaid.

2. [_To enclose a letter in a parcel, packet of samples or newspaper, posted an such, shall be an offense punishable by a fine of not less than ten or more than forty dollars in each case._]

3. The Postmaster General may grant licenses, revocable at pleasure, to Agents, other than Postmasters, for the sale to the Public, of Postage Stamps and Stamped envelopes, and may allow to such Agents a commission not exceeding five per cent, on the amount of their sales;--and it shall not be lawful for any person to exercise the business of selling Postage Stamps or Stamped envelopes to the Public unless duly licensed to do so by the Postmaster General and under such conditions as he may prescribe: and any person who shall violate this provision by selling Postage Stamps or Stamped envelopes to the public without a license from the Postmaster General, shall on conviction before a Justice of the Peace, incur a penalty of not exceeding forty dollars for each offence.

5. The Postmaster General may, when in his judgment the public convenience requires it, establish Street Letter Boxes or Pillar Boxes for the reception of letters and other mailable matter in the streets of any City or Town in this Province, and from the time that a letter is deposited in any such Street Letter Box or Pillar Box it shall be deemed to be a Post Letter within the meaning of the Post Office Act.

6. [_Wilfully injuring such letter boxes is a misdemeanor._]

8. The Governor in Council may, by regulations to be from time to time made, provide for the transmission through the Mails of this Province, of patterns and samples of merchandise and goods for sale, and of packages of seeds, cuttings, bulbs, roots and scions or grafts, on such terms and conditions as may be set forth in such regulations.

9. [_Wilfully destroying, damaging or detaining any of above articles is a misdemeanor._]

The only other item to quote from the report of 1867 is the following:--"On 1st July, 1867 the Union Act came into operation, and brought under one central administration the Postal Service throughout the Dominion." With this statement we close the account of the Postal history of the Province of Canada, and in the next chapter open up the larger one of the Dominion of Canada, whose later issues, though not without interest, still lack the charm that time can never tear from the simple, yet dignified and beautiful stamps of the Province.

CHAPTER VII

THE DOMINION OF CANADA

PRELIMINARY.

As outlined in our Introductory Chapter, the union of Upper and Lower Canada into the single Province of Canada had been so manifestly advantageous that it started an agitation for the union of all the British North American provinces. The result was a convention, held at Quebec in 1864, which drafted a proposed Const.i.tution that was later embodied by the British Parliament in "An Act for the Union of Canada, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick, and the Government thereof,"[85] which was pa.s.sed on the 29th March, 1867. The preamble recites that "the provinces of Canada, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick have expressed their desire to be federally united into One Dominion under the Crown of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, with a Const.i.tution similar in Principle to that of the United Kingdom." The Act is cited in brief as "The British North America Act 1867," and provides that the Dominion of Canada shall be divided into four provinces named Ontario, Quebec, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick; that there shall be a Governor General who may select his own Privy Council; that there shall be a Parliament consisting of a Senate, with members appointed by the Governor General for life, and a House of Commons of elected representatives; that the seat of Government shall be at Ottawa; that each Province shall have a Lieutenant Governor appointed by the Governor General and a local legislature similar to the Dominion Parliament; and making provision for the admission of Newfoundland, Prince Edward Island, British Columbia and Rupert's Land and the North-western Territory. The Act took effect on the 1st July, 1867, which day is annually observed as "Dominion Day."

[85] 30^o--31^o Vict. Cap. III.

The first Parliament of Canada, which convened at Ottawa on November 6, 1867, was naturally largely concerned in revising and consolidating the laws of the various Provinces, and among these of course appeared the Post Office Laws. A number of changes were introduced, but many of the provisions of former Acts were embodied almost as they stood in the new statute. We reproduce its most important features in our line of inquiry.

31^o Vict. Cap. X.

An Act for the regulation of the Postal Service.

[_a.s.sented to 21st. December_, 1867.]

Her Majesty, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate and House of Commons of Canada, enacts as follows: