s. They were impressed with the radical
differences between the United States and most other countries where
parcel post was in operation, and hesitated to recommend the
introduction of a general service. But the members of the Sub-Committee
had in mind to introduce as soon as practicable a complete system by the
method of enlarging the scope of the fourth-class regulations and
reducing the rates of postage. Numerous witnesses appeared before the
Sub-Committee, representing general societies of business men, such as
the National Dairy Union, the Associated Retailers of St. Louis, Me.,
and the Retail Dry Goods Association of New York; educational or social
societies, such as the American Library Association, the Postal Progress
League, and the Knights of Labour; farmers' societies, such as the State
Granges and the Farmers' Educational and Co-operative Union of America.
Several farmers, lawyers, and other gentlemen appeared to give their own
personal views. The chief opposition to the parcel-post came from the
representatives of the retailers, who stand in constant fear of losing
their business to the mail-order or catalogue houses. The business of
these houses is very large, amounting in the aggregate to nearly
$200,000,000 per annum, and there is perhaps some reason for the local
merchants' apprehensions. The bulk of the mail-order traffic is,
however, distributed as freight. But the country merchants were much
alarmed, and there were doleful prophecies of the results of a parcel
post. The local merchant was represented as the mainstay of the
country-side. He it was who sustained the country town, which afforded
so valuable a local market for the farmer. He it was to whom alone that
same farmer could look for credit to tide him over bad times. He it was
who made the country town a social centre where the farmer might come
into touch with civilization and refinement. And on the continuance of
the prosperity of the country merchant depended the continuance of the
army of travelling salesmen, without whose patronage railroads would be
driven to reduce the number of trains, hotels would go out of business,
and throughout the country accommodation for travellers would be found
extremely poor. In short, parcel post would reduce the country merchant
to the same condition as the small shopkeeper in Europe; and the country
towns would become mere hamlets and deserted villages.[422]

The parcel post was, of course, as likely in 1