Ramsey & Carmick, contract.

I have spent several years of intense labor and a large amount of money in bringing this enterprise to its present position. I have passed through many deep and almost impenetrable barriers, and no impediment shall stop the consummation of this great national work, save that of the hand of Providence. I am sustained by capital and energy, and I know no fail where perseverance can do the work. My future reputation and welfare is largely involved in the success of this project, and I sincerely beg that you will form no premature opinion on this subject against my interest. I do not, however, believe that you would do so, without an honest conviction of your judgment; but I do know that all enterprises must expect opposition from various causes. Envy is no small feature to contend with; and we have had to combat against it, solely upon the ground that we have not been disposed to divide our interest with others. The late administration was made aware of these facts, and they received with great caution any information coming from doubtful sources.

I most respectfully ask that you will give an order, permitting me, as one of the contractors, to carry a mail over this route from California, leaving it optional with persons to send by this way, and to designate the same on the letter; and in giving such an order, I wish you particularly to state that the department will in _no way be bound for any future remuneration for the service_.

Very respectfully, your obedient servant,

E. H. CARMICK.

Hon. JAMES CAMPBELL.

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OFFICE OF THE MEXICAN OCEAN MAIL AND INLAND CO., _November 23, 1853_.

SIR: In accordance with a request from Messrs. Ramsey and Carmick, the contractors named in the contract hereinafter mentioned, I have the honor of reporting to your department _the real character of the relations this company sustains to the contract; the obstacles to the non-fulfilment of it by a date as early as was anticipated; and a few remarks explanatory of the route_.

On the 15th day of February, 1853, a contract was made by the United States government, acting by the Postmaster General, with Albert C. Ramsey and Edward H. Carmick, of Pennsylvania, to carry the United States mails between San Francisco and Vera Cruz, at certain definite and specific periods mentioned in the schedule of the contract, for the sum of $424,000 per year, for the period of four years, with the privilege of extending it one year if the Post Office Department thought proper. This contract was not of that liberal form heretofore characteristic of all the other ocean mail contracts, but was in a form of that specific and detailed character peculiar to any short land service, where time might be insured to a minute. The contract was, in fact, so stringent as to be incompatible with any but an honest intention to fulfil its spirit and letter, in which spirit it was, in fact, assumed by the parties associated in its performance. This contract was printed and sent to the Senate at its last session, and is now on its files. By the 5th section of the law of 1848 it is illegal for contractors to assign their contracts; and although aware that the department is not bound to recognise any but the contractors, yet, frankness enforces the propriety of saying that, by specific covenants, this company have agreed with Messrs. Ramsey and Carmick to fulfil all the conditions of the contract on their part, to be kept and performed in relation to the land service between Vera Cruz and Acapulco, and that similar covenants have been made with the Pacific Mail Steamship Company (William H. Aspinwall, esq., president) for the sea service between Acapulco and San Francisco. The contract distinctly specified that its schedule time (and in fact the spirit of the contract) was to the intent that it should form part and parcel of the contract for the gulf service, being an extension of two of the trips between New Orleans and Vera Cruz, made (under a specific law, August 30, 1852) with Mr. Carmick, so as to form, in its own language, “_one through-line in sixteen days between New Orleans and San Francisco_.” The gulf contract is without any condition as to an appropriation; but the larger or Pacific contract is made contingent upon an appropriation by Congress for its approval. The question might be gravely raised, in looking at one contract as an integral part of the other, whether the appropriation by Congress of $70,000 (a trifle more than it was bid for and taken by Mr. Carmick, viz: $69,750) for the gulf service, was not an approval in terms of the Pacific contract, and discharged the condition of approval contained in it. But inasmuch as the parties associated in the enterprise have no covert policy to pursue, and have not yet been able to carry the mails in contract schedule time between Acapulco and San Francisco, (although they have carried it repeatedly in six days, or two days less than schedule time, between New Orleans and Acapulco,) they have no disposition to raise issues or ask for unearned appropriations. They presented their claims to the last administration on the sole integrity, feasibility, and celerity of their route; the proposals for the service were regularly advertised, and the contract awarded to the parties as the lowest bidders, but not until the most critical, searching, and minute examination was made of the practicability of the whole route. The investigation was pursued by the late Postmaster General Hubbard with a critical acumen that must have detected any imperfection. The grants made to this company by the Mexican government, and authenticated according to the highest forms known to the Mexican laws, were not only critically examined, but verified at Washington by the Mexican legation. These grants, instead of interfering with treaty stipulations, will, if honestly developed, prove most conservative elements in sustaining such stipulations by the promotion of commercial, social, and domestic intercourse, and by the infusion of fraternal comity in political and civil relations.

_The obstacles to the non-fulfilment of the Pacific service._—As before stated, the contractors, this company, and the Pacific Mail Steamship Company, entered into mutual covenants, by which the latter company obligated themselves to carry the mails between San Francisco and Acapulco according to the contract and schedule time as therein set forth by the department. At the date of the contract the Pacific Mail Steamship Company were running a weekly line of steamers between Panama and San Francisco, in the weeks intervening with their semi-monthly mail; and the late administration intended, by this weekly line and the Vera Cruz and Acapulco route, to send a weekly instead of semi-monthly mail to San Francisco, and in sixteen days from New Orleans instead of twenty-eight days (the average at that time of the semi-monthly mails) from New York. The Pacific Mail Steamship Company withdrew their weekly line, which of course prevented the execution of the Pacific service in contract time until steamers could be placed on the line between Acapulco and San Francisco, and which this company are making arrangements to effect, not only in reference to the line from New Orleans, but from New York, so as to carry passengers in sixteen or eighteen days from New York to San Francisco. In consequence, however, of the (early) non-performance of the Pacific service in schedule time, it is understood that your department rescinded the order made by the late Postmaster General Hubbard for the postmasters at New Orleans, San Francisco, San Diego, Monterey, and to forward letters by this route. The disappointment of the contractors by the withdrawal of the weekly line was great and embarrassing, and disordered the whole arrangements of this company; and while we respectfully defer to the abstract correctness of the position taken by the Post Office Department on account of it, we yet hope that a great enterprise, so eminently calculated to benefit our commerce, and one so earnestly demanded by our southern and western citizens, as intimately connected with their interests, might have a little further time to place itself right before Congress and the department.

It is respectfully suggested, in this connexion, that the Gulf service is punctually performed twice a month, and will be three times a month as soon as the steamer “Vera Cruz,” now nearly ready, can be finished; that the land-service, _as will be hereafter shown_, (see appendix,) has been performed, carrying an independent mail in sixty hours, (instead of one hundred and twenty hours, schedule time;) that this company have not asked for any special favors from the department—no advance on the appropriations—as other ocean mail companies have done; that no pay is asked for until the service is performed, and the money honestly and equitably earned; and that the 2d section of the law of March 3, 1851, is applicable to our case, viz: that the Postmaster General by this law “_shall be bound to select the speediest, safest, and most economical route_.”

We deprecate a negation of the contract by the department until further time is allowed us; and it is believed, in view of these facts and the spirit of the law last referred to, that our enterprise may receive an impartial consideration and presentation in your annual report on the Post Office Department. An official condemnation, emanating from the department under your administration, would be a serious obstacle in the development of the Mexican grants. _It is believed by many that the department had full power under the law to make the contract without the intervention of Congress for its approval_; but having been made with that contingency, it is now only asked that this enterprise may go before Congress on its own merits and integrity. A spirit of frank and honorable dealing renders it necessary for the undersigned to say, that a difference exists among the associated parties as to the real value and bearing of a government contract on this enterprise, and this difference may have reached the ears of the department.

Some of the parties believe that a government contract nationalizes the route, and gives it an importance superior to mere individual enterprise, and that the imperative necessity of “_making time_” insures more despatch. Others of the parties believe that a line of fast steamers from New Orleans to Vera Cruz, for the increasing southern and western travel from the valleys of the Mississippi and Ohio rivers, (composing the source of nearly seven-tenths of the whole resident population of California out of the city of San Francisco,) and another fast line of steamers from New York to Vera Cruz in six or seven days, by steamers built expressly for mail and passenger service, (and not naval service,) of about one thousand tons, in connexion with similar steamers from Acapulco to San Francisco in six days, would form a line that would take precedence of all others for celerity and certainty. Experience has exploded the idea that the mail and naval service can be performed by the same steamers, and an examination of the steamers now in the employ of the United States and mail-service department verifies the position that steamers suitable for a marine battery are too slow for “mail-service,” and that the light and fast steamer which can be propelled three hundred and fifty miles in twenty-four hours is not suitable for a battery corresponding with her tonnage or power adequate to such speed. They believe that such a line, by this overland route, in sixteen, or eighteen, or twenty days, with an independent mail, would seriously diminish the postage receipts of the government, if not virtually supersede them, and render the present mail contracts a sinecure in the hands of the parties holding them. If offices should be opened in proper places for the receipt of mail-matter by advertisements, and the company should enclose that mail-matter in government-stamped envelopes, and guaranty the delivery of the mail by this route in six, eight, or ten days earlier than by the present government route, it is evident that the great bulk of the mail-matter would go by the quickest route, even at double, triple, or perhaps quadruple the present charge for postage. Such an independent mail (_clearly within the law_) would, it is confidently believed, measurably supersede the government mail, and reduce the postage to a pittance. Moreover, such an independent line, not being trammeled by government time, might connect with it English, West India, Australian, and Asiatic mails, all of which are specifically allowed by the several Mexican grants held by this company; and it is believed that the time is not far distant when an English express independent mail in forty-seven days, with Australia, will be in operation. It is also thought by some, that this company should be entirely disembarrassed in order to give an exclusive right to certain foreign interests.

Having frankly stated the difference of opinion on this subject among the associates in this enterprise, it is proper to say that a route nationalized by a public contract is the true official expression of the company’s opinion, and the one which is now before the department. In conclusion on this point, it is respectfully suggested that this route is to be one of the great inter-oceanic routes of Atlantic, California, and Asiatic travel; that this enterprise may be fully developed by the present administration of our government without expense in its initial operations, but mainly by a prudent forbearance and official approbation, and by an order to carry such mail matter as our citizens may choose to send by it.

The enterprise is emphatically a southern and western one; although originated by Pennsylvanians, yet its vitality is due to New Orleans and southern influence, as the very numerous memorials on the files of the department or Congress, and signed by southern and western senators and members, will attest. The steamer Texas, which has been performing the Gulf service during the last summer, has carried a large amount of specie into New Orleans, (at the rate of one million and a quarter per annum;) and soon as the specie and express wagons of this company are fully at work, millions of dollars will flow into the New Orleans mint from the gold placers and silver mines of Mexico now being worked by American and Mexican combined skill.

_Of the practicability of the route._—The direct mail route runs from Vera Cruz, by the way of Orizava, Cordova, Puebla, Matamoras, Chietla, Mitapec, Kalcozotitlan, Chilapa, Tixtla, to Acapulco, with branches from Puebla up to Mexico and via Cuernavaca.

This road was called by Humboldt the “_Asiatic road_,” as indicative of the maritime commerce of Spain; _and is the oldest road on the continent of America_. This route is no new thing, as many suppose, but the whole enterprise is but a recast of one developed long before our country had its name or a place among the nations of the earth.

Hundreds of millions of dollars have been received by the government of Old Spain, transported over this road, in the interchange of productions between the flotas of Spain and the galleons of the Indies, and millions of American commerce are yet to be rolled over it in the progress of American enterprise. The distance direct (as will be seen by the annexed itinerary) from Vera Cruz to Acapulco is 404 miles, and via the city of Mexico 517. Colonel Ramsey has since shortened this distance to under 390 miles, and it will be reduced to less than 350.

Over this road the materials and machinery for the vast coffee and sugar plantations of Mexico have to be transported, and these plantations for magnitude and productions are almost unequalled.

From the fact that the current of foreign travel has been turned towards the capital of Mexico, by the way of Jalapa and Perote, and also from the further fact that the very _limited amount of American_ knowledge of Mexico is associated with the line of operations of the American army during the late war, less is publicly or _correctly_ known of our lower, or more southern route, than of the upper or northern route. The lower and shorter route presents the facilities of being six hours shorter to Puebla, and of having lower grades, and a climate unequalled for healthfulness, salubrity, and intertropical luxuriance of productions.

There are features about the roads of Mexico generally that distinguish them from our northern roads; they are not muddy, having no frosts to produce periodic deterioration; they are only slightly disturbed during the rainy months of June, July, and August. The rains during these rainy months are not continuous, all-day rains, but fall in showers seldom longer than an hour, generally in the afternoons and at night, and the intervals between these showers are unclouded and salubrious. The whole geological formation of Mexico is eccentric, and the soil generally composed of the debris of matter of volcanic origin. Such materials form the best roads, and with an exemption from frosts, dust, mud, and rain, except in the rainy seasons, and with no fences to obstruct the facilities for turnpike, road-making, and travelling, presented in this part of Mexico, are unequalled.

It should be remembered that this company are not encumbered with the necessity of enormous expenditures for making canals, building railroads and plank-roads, to develop their resources; they have only to expend under $50,000 to make one of the finest roads in the finest climate of North America, to travel smoothly and pleasantly, at the rate of seven and ten miles per hour, from the Atlantic to the Pacific ocean.

From the certificate of Mr. Blumenkron, (see Appendix A,) a gentleman intimately acquainted with the whole route from personal observation, it will be seen that the facilities for the transportation of mails and passengers across the republic is the work of but little effort and expense; and from the extracts of Colonel Ramsey’s letter, (see Appendix B,) it will be seen what has actually been done. From these statements—and they are daily corroborated by Americans and Mexicans who have passed over the route—it appears that the mails have been carried over (at the worst of all seasons, the rainy ones) in 50, 60, 70, 80, and 81 hours; that the letter of Mr. Tyler announces their arrival at Acapulco in six days from New Orleans, and that the mail time across may be reduced to 48 hours, and passenger time to 54.

The difficulties, dangers, and expense of mail transportation over this route are not comparable with the Panama route, as it formerly was, or even as it now is, as to the 17 miles yet uncovered by railroad; and this company confidently believe that they will be able to carry the mails over this route for a sum 50 per cent. per mile less than by the Panama route, and in a time under three days.

The company have placed a portion of their rolling stock upon the road, at present equal to the transportation of fifty passengers per week from ocean to ocean. This rolling stock consists of the very best built Albany and Troy post-coaches, Concord (New Hampshire) passenger, baggage, express and specie wagons, and about 500 horses and mules, (at the last report 493.)

It is hoped the next advices from Colonel Ramsey will give information that this rolling stock is in operation. It is intended to increase the rolling stock with the increase of travel. The local travel and business in Mexico will alone pay a large interest on the investment; and were there no connexion with steamers on either side, and as a mere stage route, the profits will be large, especially when that portion of the route through the State of Guerrero is properly worked and widened, and over a portion of the route the company hold the exclusive right of passage, ferries, tolls, &c., for fifty years.