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314 METHODS OF SOCIAL REFORM.
currency, the proper limits of government industry, and ao
forth. But, as Postmaster-General, the Professor ignores
all theory, and disclaims all liability, notwithstanding
anything whatsoever.” Though hardly rcsponsibk for the
details of a Scheme framed while he was yet merely a
professor, he will become responsible for them if he advocates
the passage of the Bill through Parliament, or if he allows
tho schemo to crop up again in a subsequent session.
The worst point of the Bill is that it provides no regulations
for the cuatody or disposal of the large sum of money
which will be pid iuto thc Departnlent, if the public takes a
fancy to the notes. It is quitc impossible to estimate, by any
rcferencc to theory or fact, how large the balance will be. In
all probability it will not bo less than two or three millions
sterling, and quite likely double that. If the ordcrs shodd
prove to be popular in tho capacity of paper money, the circulation
might possibly amount to twenty millions. No ordinary
person, indeed, can pretend to understand how tho Post Office
poople can manago to keep a cash reserve at each of nearly
sin thousnnd Money Order Offices. Narkets, fairs, races,
currents of tourists, fluctuations of trade must cause great and
often uncxpected vuriutions of dcmand, and it is financially
absurd and impossible, r~nd against all the principles of bnnking,
to divide n cnuh reserve into six thousand fragments !
Nor, indeed, i5 there any provision for the regulation of a
motrrllic reserve, or any reserve nt all. The Department would,
no doubh, like to have n few millions at their unfettered disposal;
but surely a Post Officc Bank Charter Act, devoid of
any mention of a cash reserve, and with careful provisions for
suspendiug payment whenever convenient, is a monstrous
anomsly, and, I may almost say, an indt to the financial
common sense of tho country.
I suppose we ought to feel indebted to the postal authorit,ies
for condescending to give us the pretty full details
contained in the present Bill and Draft Regulations. The
earliest form of the scheme, as embodied in the Bill of June,
1877, consisted in simply suspending, as regards the Post
Oftice, all laws restricting t.he issue of promissory notes pay-