(1853) had reduced the stamp duties on
newspapers,[299] and repealed the duties on advertisements. A further
Act (the Newspaper Stamp Duties Act of 1855, 18 & 19 Vict. cap. 27),
repealed the stamp duty, as such, in respect of newspapers, and provided
that periodical publications conforming to certain conditions should be
entitled to free transmission by post, if "printed within the United
Kingdom on paper stamped for denoting the rate of duty now imposed by
law on newspapers." The chief conditions were that the publication
should be issued at intervals not exceeding thirty-one days, should bear
the title and date of publication at the top of every page, and should
not be printed on or bound in pasteboard or cardboard. The maximum limit
of weight for publications not strictly newspapers, which in 1854 had
been raised to 3 ounces, was now abolished, and newspapers and all other
stamped periodical publications were made subject to the same
restrictions as to number of sheets and extent of letterpress, etc.
Concurrently with the passing of this Act, the book post rates were
reduced with the view of permitting the transmission of unstamped
newspapers at low rates of postage.[300]

Under the Act of 1855, stamp duty at the rate payable at that time under
the existing law must be paid in order to secure the privilege of free
transmission of newspapers by post. The duty was chargeable according to
the number of sheets; and in the case of some leading newspapers, such
as _The Times_ and the _Illustrated London News_, amounted to 1-1/2d.
per copy for each issue. The proprietors of these publications in 1858
approached the Post Office with the view of obtaining a reduction of the
charge for the transmission of their papers by post. This request was
submitted by the Post Office, and was met by the Government in a liberal
spirit. In view of the importance now attached by Parliament to the free
circulation of newspapers, as shown by the removal of taxation from
them, an object of scarcely inferior importance to the circulation of
letters, it was now decided that since the whole of the existing system
rested on the assumption that the free circulation of newspapers in
general was an object of importance, and one to be attained even at a
disproportionate cost to the Post Office, a line should not be drawn so
as to exclude from the lowest rate one paper, and that paper the one
with the largest circulation. Such was the result of the exist