Democratic Sentinel, Volume 19, Number 25, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 28 June 1895 — The Government a Great Publisher. [ARTICLE]

The Government a Great Publisher.

How vast a business is carried on by the Government printing, office may be gathered from the fact that more than 8,000 operatives are employed, at wages aggregating about $2,1)00,000 a year; that 40,888,598 copies of separate documents were ■printed in 1894; that the number of pages of type set the same year was 280,152 (exclusive Of the Congressional Record), and that for a single report (that of the Secretary of Agriculture) more than 1,000,000 pounds of book printing papey were received. The statement frequently made that this is the most extensive printing office in the world is borne out by its operations, although by no means

true of its building The latter Is t® the last degree unsuited to so vast a business, being old, overcrowded, and notoriously unsafe. The rapid development and increase of government printing is shown conspicuously In the figures of its annual cost. In 1819 all the printing and binding of the government required an expenditure of only #63,000. In a report made to Congress in 1859, the whole cost from 1819 to 1858 was stated at #B,574,842, while the printing for the six years 1858 to 1859 cost #8,462,655, or about as much in six years as in the previous thirty-three years. This extravagance led to the final establishment of the Government printing office; and the greatly expanded business of multiplying books and documents ever since is shown in the figures of annual expenditure, which were In 1868, for printing and binding, #1.417,750; in 1870, #1,609,860; in 1880, #2,084,751; in 1890, #8,124,462; and in 1894 #3,940,410. The cost of Government printing and binding in Great Britain in 1894 was £522,500, or about #2,600,000; but as this included stationery for all the public offices, and as no free document distribution exists there,except one copy to each member of Parliament, there are far more elements of contrast than of comparison.