THE EARL OF SANDWICHbegged to ask the noble Duke the Postmaster General what were the reasons which induced him to withdraw the prosecution of the postmaster at Huntingdon at the last assizes? The case was that the postmaster, being the agent for the sale of an article by a London tradesman, opened a letter containing a Post-office order and an order for the article in question, and sent up to town a Post-office order in his own name for the sum for which the other order was drawn, less the amount of his own commission. The case against him was fully made out, and, indeed, he had confessed his offence, but the prosecution was not carried out against him. In a case in Staffordshire, the postmaster at Rugely opened a letter, and was prosecuted to conviction, and was now undergoing imprisonment for the offence. He thought that it should be fully known that in all cases of this kind the Post-office officials would meet with punishment.
THE DUKE OF ARGYLLsaid, that in the case of the Postmaster of Huntingdon, it had appeared to the Post-office authorities that it was not an offence which was intended to defraud the revenue, but that the alteration in the amount of the Post-office order, and the substitution of another, was only for the purpose of obtaining a small commission to which he was entitled on the sale of the article ordered from a London tradesman, whose agent he was. The course pursued by the Post-office authorities was to punish 1047 official offences themselves; but in a cases of criminal prosecution for felony the Law Officers of the Crown were consulted. In this instance the case had been submitted to the Attorney General, and he did not advise that a prosecution should be instituted. In the Staffordshire case, the Attorney General advised that the postmaster of Rugely should be prosecuted. But though no prosecution was instituted against the postmaster of Huntingdon, he had been dismissed by the Post-office authorities.