and if it attempted to do so the contract would be void under the Interstate Commerce law. The terms of the mail contracts are substantially dictated by the Postmaster-General and by Congress and the latter ought, in justice both to the railways and to the Government, to require the former to make annual weighings in order that the scheme of payment provided in the law may be fairly and accurately applied. Railways are required to transfer the mails between their stations and all post offices not more than a quarter of a mile distant from the former and, at the election of the Post Office Department, to make similar transfers at terminals. For the former no compensation is accorded, and for the latter the allowances are inadequate. There are numerous instances in which these extra services require expenditures, on the part of the railways concerned, that exceed the total compensation of the mail routes on which they occur. The extent of these requirements in particular cases is largely subject to the will of the Department and this produces unreasonable uncertainties as to what may be demanded during the life of any contract. The basis of payment plainly does not contemplate such services, they are a survival from the period when the mails were carried by stage-coaches, which could readily deviate these distances from their ordinary routes, and it is clear that the Government ought to perform these services itself or reasonably compensate the railways therefor. Much of the mail moved by the railways is carried in cars especially equipped as traveling post offices in order that it may be accompanied by postal clerks who perform, on the journey, precisely the labor which they would otherwise perform in local post offices. Cars so used can be but lightly loaded and are costly to supply, to equip, to maintain and to move. Their use has greatly increased the efficiency of the postal service and vastly expedited the handling of the mails. In the infancy of this service Congress provided for additional payments for the full cars so required, but when the practice of requiring portions of cars for the same identical purpose was inaugurated no provision for paying for them was made and this condition never has been corrected. Even in Document No. 105, the injustice of this situation is recognized (page 3) and the Postmaster-General asserts that it is a purely arbitrary discrimination and without logical basis. Obviously a reasonable allowance for apartment cars ought to be made. XI. THE POSTMASTER-GENERAL'S PROPOSED PLAN OF PAYMENT BASED UPON OPERATING COST AND TAXES, TO BE ASCERTAINED BY THE POST OFFICE DEPARTMENT, PLUS SIX PER CENT. IS SERIOUSLY WRONG IN PRINCIPLE AND WOULD ENCOURAGE AND PERPETUATE INJUSTICE.