Mr. Armour then petitioned the local Legislature, and towards the end of the year a Committee of the House of Assembly was appointed to consider the whole question of the management of the Post Office in the province of Lower Canada. The Committee found it impossible to obtain any useful information concerning the finances of the service from the Deputy Postmaster-General, Mr. T. A. Stayner, whose attitude was a source of much irritation, resulting in great intensity of feeling both against the privilege of the Deputy and the administration of the service from London. In 1832 the publishers in Upper Canada, who were working in concert with the publishers of Lower Canada, also succeeded in obtaining the appointment of a Committee of the House of Assembly. This Committee, in its Report, challenged the legality of any postage charge whatever raised in the province under authority of the British Postmaster-General. In 1833 the publishers in Nova Scotia submitted a petition to the King, but obtained no satisfaction.[311] In the Lower Provinces there was a sentiment in favour of the free transmission of newspapers, which had been encouraged, if not originally induced, by the circumstance that for a considerable period the holder of the office of Deputy Postmaster-General for those provinces, Mr. Howe, took little trouble to enforce the payment of that postage which, when paid, was his perquisite, preferring to forgo the proceeds rather than incur the risk of odium which might attach to any attempt to enforce his privilege.[312] In 1842 Mr. Edmund Ward, the publisher of the _Federation Sentinel_, petitioned the Lieutenant-Governor and House of Assembly in New Brunswick for the abolition of the postage rate on newspapers, on the grounds that it was illegal, a tax on knowledge, and of no benefit to the public revenue, since the proceeds were retained by an official already adequately remunerated for his services. The petition was submitted to the Home authorities; and the Solicitor to the Post Office advised that, since the Act of 1837 repealed the Act of the 4th of George III, cap. 34, the charge on newspapers made by the Deputy Postmaster-General in North America rested on no legal basis, and long established usage and custom was the only justification for allowing newspapers to pass by post at less than the legal rate. The House of Assembly in New Brunswick also took up the question on their own account. Like the Nova Scotians, they were anxious to facilitate the distribution of newspapers. They regarded the charge for postage as an odious tax on knowledge, and in 1844, in a joint Address to his Majesty, recommended its abolition.