The old repealed Act of 1656 recited above is particularly interesting, as showing the early statutory monopoly vested in the post office. The monopoly still continues, but now it depends upon the Act of 1837, section 2 of which confers upon the Postmaster-General " the exclusive privilege of conveying from one place to another all letters," except in certain specified cases, and also "the exclusive privilege of performing all the incidental services of receiving, collecting, despatching, and delivering all letters," except also in certain specified cases. The cases so specified create the following exemptions from the I'ostmaster General's exclusive privilege : (I) Letters sent by a private friend on his way, journey, or travel, to be delivered by the friend to the person to whom they are directed ; (2) Letters sent by a messenger on purpose, concerning the private affairs of the sender or receiver thereof: commissions or returns thereof: and affidavits and writs, process or proceedings or returns thereof, issuing out of a Court of Justice ; (3) Letters sent out of the United Kingdom by a private vessel (not being a packet boat); (4) Letters of merchants, owners of vessels of mer chandise, or of the cargo or loading therein, sent by such vessels of merchandise, or by any person employed by the owners for the carriage of the letters, according to their respective directions, and delivered to the respective persons to whom they are directed, without paying or receiving hire or reward, advantage or profit, for the same in anywise. (Such, if handed over to the post office on arrival in the United Kingdom, will be delivered on payment of the postage as on prepaid inland letters, provided that the owners, charterers, or consignees are described as such on the address and superscription) ; (5) Letters concerning goods or merchandise scat by common known carriers, to be delivered with the goods which such letters concern, without hire or other advantage for receiving or delivering such letters. No person, however, is authorised to make a collection of such excepted letters for the purpose of sending them in the manner above described. The following persons arc expressly forbidden to carry a letter, or to receive or collect or deliver one, even though they do not receive a hire or reward : (a) Common known carriers, their servants or agents, except a letter concerning goods in their carts or waggons, or on their pack-horses ; and owners, drivers, or guards of stagecoaches; (b) Owners, masters, or commanders of ships, vessels, steamboats, or boats called or being passage or packet-boats, sailing or passing coastwise or otherwise between places between Great Britain or Ireland, or between, to, or from ports within His Majesty's dominions or territories out of the United Kingdom, or their servants or agents, except in respect of letters of merchants, owners of ships, or goods on board ; (c) Passengers or other persons on board any such ships, vessels, steamboat, passage or packet-boat ; and (d) The owners of or sailors or others on board a ship or boat passing on a river or navigable canal within the United Kingdom or other of His Majesty's dominions.
By another Act of the same year the monopoly is protected by the following important penal provisions.
Exclusive privilege of the Postmaster-General.—Any person convey ing, otherwise than by the post, a letter (which by law includes a packet) not exempted from the exclusive privilege of the Postmaster-General, or who performs, otherwise than by post, any services incidental to conveying letters from place to place, whether by receiving, or by taking up, or by collecting, or by order ing, or by despatching, or by carrying or re-carrying, or by delivering a letter not exempted from such privilege, incurs by law a penalty of .£5 for every letter, and .£100 for every week the practice is continued. A person who sends or causes to be sent, otherwise than by post, a letter not exempted from such privilege is also liable to similar penalties.
Other offences.—Of the many statutory offences against the Post-Office laws some few may be usefully referred to here. It is an indictable offence for a post-office employee to open, detain, or delay a post letter contrary to his duty, or to steal, embezzle, secrete, or destroy one ; any person to steal or unlawfully take away a post letter-bag sent by a post-office packet, or a letter out of the bag, or unlawfully to open it ; any person fraudulently to retain a post letter delivered by mistake, or wilfully to secrete or detain it ; any person employed under or acting for the Post-Office to disclose, make known, or intercept the contents of a telegram contrary to his duty ; any person to place or attempt to place in or against a post-office letter-box any fire, match, light, explosive, or dangerous substance or filth, or to do anything likely to injure the box or its contents ; any person to send or attempt to send a postal packet enclosing explo sive, dangerous, or deleterious substance, or indecent or obscene print or article, or having thereon indecent, obscene, or offensive words ; any person to forge or wilfully and without due authority to alter a telegram, or utter a forged telegram, or transmit a false telegram ; any person who is not a post-office employee or a parent or guardian of the addressee of the letter, maliciously and with intent to injure some other person, to open or cause to be opened, a letter intended for and addressed to another person, or to do anything to prevent or impede the delivery of the letter. But it is only an offence punishable on summary convic tion for the master of an outward bound vessel to refuse to take a mail tendered to him for conveyance, or to open or take a letter from a mail, or not duly to deliver a mail ; and for a collector of tolls, ferryman, or gatekeeper, to demand tolls for mails, or stop or delay mails ; and for a person employed to carry or deliver post letter-bags or post letters to lose them, or being drunk, negligent, or misconducting himself, to thereby endanger or delay mails. And a similarly punishable offence is it for any person—to wilfully obstruct post-office officials or business ; or to place or maintain without due authority on a house, wall, window, or place the word " post-office " ; or fraudulently to remove from a post letter a postage stamp or post-mark with intent to use it for another letter, or otherwise do something with the intention of defrauding the postal revenue ; or to affix, or attempt to affix, without due authority, a placard, board, or thing on a post office, letter-box, telegraph post, or other property of the Postmaster-General, or to paint or disfigure it ; or to make, issue, or use imitation post-office envelopes, forms, stamps, or marks ; or to make, utter, knowingly use, or unlawfully possess a fictitious stamp, or an instrument for making one.
Liability of the Postmaster-General.—It was determined, so long ago as the reign of WillifLn III., in the case of Lane v. Colton, that no action can be maintained against the Postmaster-General for the loss of bills or articles sent in letters by the post. A similar action was brought, in Whitfield v. Lord Despenser, wherein the Court held that there was no resemblance, or analogy, between the postmasters and a common carrier ; and that no action for any loss in the post office could be brought against any person, except him by whose actual negligence the loss accrued. The effect of this rule is somewhat modified by the introduc tion of a scale of compensation in respect of loss or damage of REGISTERED LETTERS, and also by the limited liability gratuitously assumed, by the Post master-General in connection with the PARCELS POST, whether the particular parcel is registered or not.