But Armour persisted in his attacks in the _Gazette_, and in the two sessions which followed managed to alienate from Stayner a large measure of the good will of the house of assembly. Stayner's determination to withhold information from the assembly was a source of irritation. The facts which had come to their knowledge through questions in the house of commons at Westminster, the ungracious admissions which the possession of these facts enabled the house to extort from Stayner, and his specious and unconvincing defence of his perquisites, all combined to change the house from an attitude of friendliness to one of criticism and even hostility. The house no longer rested in the belief that, to obtain satisfaction, all that was necessary was to lay their grievances before the department. In 1832, it denounced the methods of the department, and presented an address to the governor general praying that the home government might place the post office under the control of the legislature.[217] In the session of 1833, the pertinacious Armour again appeared before the assembly. He had no new facts to present, but managed to sustain the interest of the house in the facts already before it. The assembly on this occasion set forth its views at greater length. In an address to the king,[218] it represented that the post office should not be a means of raising a revenue greater than was needed to enable it to establish offices wherever they might be required; that if the rates were higher than was necessary for that purpose they should be lowered; and that any surplus revenue should be at the disposition of the legislature for the improvement of communications by post throughout the country; also, that newspapers should pass through the post office in Lower Canada, free of postage. In the assembly in Upper Canada the post office was also vigorously assailed. There was general agreement on the proposition that the existing arrangements were not satisfactory, but on the point of remedy opinions differed sharply. The reformers, of whom Dr. Duncombe was the spokesman, adopting the argument of the Baldwin committee of 1821, insisted that the post office had no legal basis in Upper Canada. Duncombe and his associates held that it was a violation of the constitution to send any surplus revenue to Great Britain, and that it was the obvious duty of the legislature to pass an act, taking to itself the control of the provincial post office. They believed that the revenues from the service would amply suffice to cover all its expenses, but if it should turn out that such was not the case, they were prepared to meet the deficiency from the general revenues of the province.