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Autobiographical Dictation, 22 August 1907 ❉ Textual Commentary

Source document.

TS1       Typescript, leaves numbered 3059–65 (altered in ink to 2159–65), made from Hobby’s notes and revised.

Following this dictation, TS1 pages 3066–82 are Hobby’s typescript of SLC’s article “Proposition for a Postal Check,” which he designated, in the final sentence of this dictation, as “an Appendix”; for which see pages 662–69.

Dictated Augusttextual note 22, 1907

Luncheon with Henniker Heatontextual note and discussion of cheap ocean postage—Mr. Clemens’s postal check scheme.

Ashcroft’s note:

Lunched with Henniker Heatontextual note explanatory note, M.P., at the House of Commons; dined with Mr. and Mrs. Harry Brittain at the Savoy.”

The luncheon had a purpose, and lasted two hours, but it didn’t last long enough to get down to the purpose. The twelve or fifteen men present had been chosen with an eye to that purpose, which was political and commercial, and of international importance. Mr.textual note Sydney Buxton, the Postmaster Generaltextual note, was present, also T. P. O’Connorexplanatory note, M.P., also the Earl of Crawford and Balcarrestextual note explanatory note. I think all the rest were M.P.’s. I understood that all present favored the scheme—or rather the two schemes, for there were two; I had a scheme and Henniker Heatontextual note had a scheme, and our idea was to join our strength and work for both schemes; both were to be freely discussed at the luncheon, and I was to have a private heart to heart talk with the Postmaster Generaltextual note afterwards. Henniker Heatontextual note has for years been the diligent, acute, and tireless apostle of cheap ocean postage, and in spite of all kinds of official and parliamentary opposition—textual noteexcept the intelligent kind—textual notehe has carried the bulk of his dream to a successful conclusion. He had a hard time proving to doubting Parliaments and postmasters generaltextual note that if postage to the British colonies and to far-offtextual note India should be reduced from five cents to two, the resulting tremendous addition to business and social correspondence would [begin page 107] keep the revenue up to the high-water mark and secure the Government from loss, but by pluck and perseverance he succeeded. To-day you can send a letter to any British postofficetextual note anywhere on the surface of the globe for two cents; no harm has happened to the revenue, the cheapened postage has formidably augmented export business, and the whole nation has profited thereby. Henniker Heatontextual note is now laboringtextual note to establish a two-cent rate with all foreign countries, including the United States. Present conditions exhibit curious anomalies. For instance: the postage on a letter mailed direct from England to New York City is five cents; but if you send it to New York by way of Canada textual note, the expense is only two cents, although the distance is greater. You can send merchandise in a liner from London to New York attextual note ten dollars per ton, but the same ship charges ten times as much per ton for mail matter, while the expense involved in caretaking and transportation is no greater in the one case than in the other. Henniker Heatontextual note is finding it as difficult to enlighten and convert our Congresses as if they were just British Parliaments, and no whit saner.

My project was a postal check—a notion which I conceivedtextual note and elaborated in Vienna about the end of 1897, and further elaborated and ultimatelytextual note completed in the summer and falltextual note of 1898explanatory note. Our minister at the Courttextual note of Vienna at the time was Charlemagne Tower, our present Ambassadortextual note to the Courttextual note of Berlin. He examined it carefully, in detail, and decided that it was good and workable, and that it would abolish our clumsy and stupid postal order system, and would also put a stop to the vast and growing and risky business of sending postage-stamps through the mail in payment for small purchases. A few days afterward I read my elaborated scheme to two other men—one of them an old friend in the insurance business, the other a new acquaintance. This document was intended for publication as a magazine article, and I have it yet, much scored by emendations, much damaged by handling, but still intact and legible. In London a year later, (’99, if my memory is sound), I came across a Harper’s Weekly with a paragraph in it which interested me. It named a member of Congress, and said he was about to bring forward a bill for a postal checkexplanatory note, and then went on and described my check with nice exactness. I judged that that young acquaintance of mine in Viennatextual note had admired my scheme enough to talk about it, and that its details had finally wandered to America and fallen under the attention of that Congressmantextual note. My name was not mentioned, but the omission was of no consequence to me; I hoped the man would push the project in Congress and make a success of it. I thought I might be able to help him, so I sent a copy of my article to McClure for publication in his magazine; I also pinned to it the clipping from Harper’s Weekly. I thought it likely that he might question the value of the articletextual note now that the clipping revealed the fact that what I was saying was lacking in freshness, and my conjecture was right; McClure did not publish it.textual note

I never heard of that Congressmantextual note or his postal check afterward. I think he was a Tennesseean, but am not sure. A year or a year and a half ago, I read in the American textual note Review of Reviews a description of a project by a Northern Congressmantextual note whereby the transmission of money by mail was to be much simplified, and at the same time rendered convenient and safe. It did not seem to me that this invention, as described and [begin page 108] explained,textual note was much of an improvement upon existing conditions, still it was a step in the right direction, and I was gratified. At my request, Dr. Shawexplanatory note, editor of the Review of Reviews, called at my house and I gave him my battered article, explained it to him, and suggested that he send it to his friend, that Congressmantextual note, to the end that he might make use of it in case he should see his way to it.

I heard no more of the matter until four or five days ago; then a parcel reached me from the Review of Reviews containing my ancient article and some other documents concerning the matter of postal checks. Also, a fresh copy of my article with “emendations;” also an invitation to aid the good cause.textual note

I find the documents interesting. One of them is House Bill 7053, entitled “A Bill to Prevent Robbing the Mail, to Provide a Safer and Easier Method of Sending Money by Mail, and to Increase the Postal Revenue.textual note Introduced December 13, 1905, by Mr. Gardner of Michigan; referred to the Committee on the Post-Office and Post-Roads, and ordered to be printed.”textual note I like the bill very much. In all its essentials it is my scheme as mapped out in my article written in Vienna in ’98 and ’99.textual note

There are some printed slips in which the various merits of a postal check are ably and urgently argued; they are the same ones used by me in my article; I do not perceive that one has been omitted. The earliest date mentioned is 1902—two or three years after my scheme leaked into print as per the paragraph published in Harper’s Weekly, as heretofore mentioned.

In these documents the scheme is called the “invention”textual note of a Mr. W. C. Postexplanatory note. It is stated, with a trace of conscious magnanimity, that he stands ready to confer it upon the Government as a free gift; he wants no money. Why,textual note even that idea is not original. In ’98 I wrote John Hay, from Viennaexplanatory note,textual note and said I had invented a postal check scheme, and asked him to talk to the Postmaster Generaltextual note about it. I remarked that the Government would not be likely to be willing to buy it of me, because upon examination the War Departmenttextual note would perceive that youtextual note couldn’t kill Christians with it, and therefore the Governmenttextual note would naturally take but a slight interest in it. Mr. Post heard about that, probably, from John Hay, or others in Washington, and it has admonished him to be magnanimous.

However, I am wandering far afield. I will inter that old postal-check article of mine in an Appendixexplanatory note, where the curious may find it if they want it—and now let us get back to London.textual note

Textual Notes Dictated August 22, 1907
  August ●  Aug. (TS1) 
  Henniker Heaton ●  Henniker-Heaton (TS1) 
  Henniker Heaton ●  Henniker-Heaton (TS1) 
  Mr. ●  Mr.  (TS1-SLC) 
  Postmaster General ●  Postmaster-General (TS1) 
  Balcarres ●  Balcarras (TS1) 
  Henniker Heaton ●  Henniker-Heaton (TS1) 
  Postmaster General ●  Postmaster-General (TS1-SLC) 
  Henniker Heaton ●  Henniker-Heaton (TS1) 
  opposition— ●  opposition,  (TS1-SLC) 
  kind— ●  kind,  (TS1-SLC) 
  postmasters general ●  postmasters-general (TS1-SLC) 
  far-off ●  far-off (TS1-SLC) 
  postoffice ●  post-office (TS1) 
  Henniker Heaton ●  Henniker-Heaton (TS1) 
  laboring ●  laboring and hoping  (TS1-SLC) 
  by way of Canada  ●  by way of Canada ‘by way of Canada’ underscored  (TS1-SLC) 
  at ●  and back at (TS1-SLC) 
  Henniker Heaton ●  Henniker-Heaton (TS1) 
  conceived ●  invented conceived  (TS1-SLC) 
  ultimately ●  ultimately  (TS1-SLC) 
  and fall ●  and fall  (TS1-SLC) 
  Court ●  court (TS1) 
  Ambassador ●  ambassador (TS1) 
  Court ●  court (TS1) 
  Vienna ●  Venice (TS1) 
  Congressman ●  congressman (TS1) 
  the article ●  it the article  (TS1-SLC) 
  it. ●  the article. it.  (TS1-SLC) 
  Congressman ●  congressman (TS1) 
  American  ●  American (TS1) 
  Congressman ●  congressman (TS1) 
  invention, as described and explained, ●  invention, as described and explained,  (TS1-SLC) 
  Congressman ●  congressman (TS1) 
  Also, a fresh . . . good cause. ●  Also, a ty fresh copy of my article with “emendations;” also an invitation to aid the good cause.  (TS1-SLC) 
  Revenue. ●  Revenue.” (TS1) 
  printed.” ●  printed. (TS1) 
  ’99. ●  finished and elaborated in February ’99. ’99.  (TS1-SLC) 
  “invention” ●  invention  (TS1-SLC) 
  Why, ●  Why,  (TS1-SLC) 
  Vienna, ●  Washington, Vienna,  (TS1-SLC) 
  Postmaster General ●  Postmaster-General (TS1) 
  War Department ●  Government War Department  (TS1-SLC) 
  you ●  it you  (TS1-SLC) 
  the Government ●  the Government  (TS1-SLC) 
  [¶] However, I . . . to London. ●  single rule canceled [¶] However, I am wandering far afield. I will fling inter that old postal-check article of mine into an Appendix, where the curious may find it if they want it—and now let us get back to London.  (TS1-SLC) 
Explanatory Notes Dictated August 22, 1907
 

Lunched with Henniker Heaton] John Henniker Heaton (1848–1914) had lived in Australia for many years, and on becoming a British member of parliament labored to improve communications among territories of the Empire. By 1898 he had succeeded in creating an Empire-wide penny postage (except for Australia, New Zealand, and the Cape Colony) and his goal was now a universal penny postage. This luncheon at the House of Commons took place on 2 July 1907. Clemens clarified his interest in British postal matters for the New York Sun’s correspondent:

I am taking up this matter on this side because it is a curious commentary on our Government that once England introduces a new system it is very easy to get the United States to follow suit. The mere fact that England has done this or that acts with wonderful effect on Congress, and if we glance back along the line of governmental reforms and ideas we find that America only adopted them after England had tried them and found them desirable. (“Mark Twain for Penny Post,” New York Sun, 2 July 1907, 2)

 

T. P. O’Connor] Thomas Power O’Connor (1848–1929) was an Irish radical journalist and politician, known as “T. P.” (given its Irish pronunciation of “Tay Pay,” as Clemens explains in the dictation of 2 October 1907). He was a member of parliament representing first Galway, then (from 1885) a largely Irish district of Liverpool. A prolific chronicler of the British political and literary scenes, he founded several newspapers. At the time of Clemens’s visit he was the editor of two weekly magazines, T. P.’s Weekly andP.T.O.

 

the Earl of Crawford and Balcarres] James Ludovic Lindsay, twenty-sixth earl of Crawford and ninth earl of Balcarres (1847–1913). His presence at this meeting in the interest of postal reform was owing to his status as an eminent stamp collector and postal historian (“Earl of Crawford Sells His Stamps,” New York Times, 9 Nov 1915, 19).

 

My project was a postal check . . . completed in the summer and fall of 1898] Clemens’s “Proposition for a Postal Check,” written in Vienna in 1898–99, advocated a scheme whereby the U.S. government would print and sell checks—prepaid, and in fixed denominations (like stamps), which would be cashable at a post office (like postal orders).

 

It named a member of Congress . . . a bill for a postal check] A bill mandating the issue of $50 million worth of “post check notes” was introduced in Congress on 16 March 1900. Congress took no action on the bill, which was reintroduced, with no action taken again, in 1902 (“A Postal Check System,” Washington Post, 17 Mar 1900, 4; “Post-Check Currency,” Los Angeles Times, 23 Mar 1902, B4; U.S. Congress 1902, 26).

 

I read in the American Review of Reviews . . . Dr. Shaw] An article by R. R. Bowker in the March 1905 American Review of Reviews endorsed a postal check system. It said nothing about any “Northern Congressman.” The editor of the Review was Albert Shaw (Bowker 1905, 331).

 

House Bill 7053 . . . the “invention” of a Mr. W. C. Post] Clemens had before him a copy of H.R. 7053 (session of 1905–6). He mistakes the name of the originator of the bill, cereal magnate C. W. Post (1854–1914). He is also mistaken in the question of priority: Post was publicly advocating a postal check in 1898, when Clemens’s article was not yet written (U.S. Congress 1906; C. W. Post 1898; “C. W. Post of Battle Creek Kills Himself,” Grand Rapids [Mich.] Press, 9 May 1914, 1, 15).

 

he stands ready to confer it upon the Government as a free gift . . . In ’98 I wrote John Hay, from Vienna] Clemens misdates his 11 March 1899 letter to John Hay, who was at this time the U.S. secretary of state. And even though he implies here that he expected no royalties on sales of his postal checks, his letter to Hay shows otherwise:

I merely want a royalty for a while—no lump sum. I only want the government to issue & sell a thing which is as simple as a post-card, & pay me a royalty of one per cent on the sales for twelve years. The government would derive other revenues from this scheme, but in those I could not share. . . . Suppose the sales were only $5,000,000 a year, & brought an additional revenue of $5,000,000; I shouldn’t receive a royalty on both sums, but only on the first-mentioned. That wouldn’t make me any richer than I ought to be—you know it yourself.

Can’t you get the government to instruct you to say to me that it will grant me that royalty if upon examining the idea it concludes to use it? (11 Mar 1899 to Hay [1st], DLC)

Later the same day Clemens wrote to Hay again, asking him not to “mention my scheme for a postal-cheque to any one. It could get into print ahead of me, for much talking is done in Vienna” (11 Mar 1899 to Hay [2nd], ViU). No reply from Hay has been found.

 

I will inter that old postal-check article of mine in an Appendix] See the Appendix “Proposition for a Postal Check.”