These are the objects for which congress is bound to maintain the post-office, and it is impossible that congress should ever seriously consider whether they will not abandon them. The maintenance of convenient mails for these objects is therefore to be regarded as a necessary function of the government of the United States. In the infancy of that government, while the government itself was an experiment, when the country was deeply in debt for the cost of our independence, and when its resources for public expenditure were untried and unknown, there was doubtless a propriety in the adoption of the principle, that the post-office department should support itself. But that state of things has long gone by, and our government now has ample ability to execute any plans of improvement whatever, for the advancement of knowledge, and for binding the Union together, provided such plans come within the acknowledged powers conferred by the constitution. The post-office being, then, like the army and navy, a necessary branch of the government, it follows that the charge of postage for the conveyance of letters and papers is of the nature of a tax, as has been well expressed by the present Postmaster-General, in his last annual report, quoted above. “_Postage is a tax_, not only on the business of the country, but upon intelligence and knowledge, and the exercise of the friendly and social affections.” The question before us is, How heavy a “tax” ought the government of a federal republic to impose on these interests? Every friend of freedom and of human improvement answers spontaneously, that nothing but a clear necessity can justify any tax at all upon such subjects, and that the tax should be reduced, in all cases, to the very lowest practicable rate. The experience of the British government, the prodigious increase of correspondence produced by cheap postage, and the immense revenue accruing therefrom, demonstrate that TWO CENTS is not below the rate which the government can afford to receive. Let the people understand that all beyond this is a mere “tax,” not required by any necessity, and they will soon demand that the government look for its resources to some more suitable subjects of taxation than these.