US Parcel Post Postage Due Question

I was glancing over the 2012 Mystic Stamp Catalog recently and came across this commentary. Notwithstanding the high price for a set of the stamps being advertised, is the text within this paragraph right or wrong?



It seems to me that Postage Due Stamps -- even Parcel Post Postage Due Stamps -- were NEVER valid for payment of postage as the highlighted box suggests.

Could this have just been a misprint and perhaps the word "postage" should have read "postage due"? I can see that these stamps may have been valid for general postage due use after the Parcel Post Stamps were discontinued, but never for regular postage.

Is this simply a misprint or is there a little known caveat in the use of these stamps back in the day that I had never been aware of?

Hmmm - good question. I do know that parcel post stamps were declared valid for postage, but I hadn't considered whether this included the postage dues.

It doesn't appear to be a misprint. Per the Scott Specialized, both the Parcel Post and Parcel Post Postage Due stamps were allowed for use as regular postage stamps and regular postage due stamps, respectively, from July 1, 1913.

EDITED 2/12 to correct my misreading of the Scott catalog -- sorry!

Interesting. I wonder if there are any examples of a Parcel Post Postage Due Stamp used for regular postage. It would be an interesting conversation piece to say the least!

Found another piece of information on this. Advance to page 19 of this presentation, wherein it states that Parcel Post Postage Dues were (after the exclusive use period) used as regular postage due stamps but that some "illegally used" them as regular postage:

http://postalmuseum.si.edu/symposiu...entation.pdf

It seems someone is wrong here. Either the presenter at the Postal Museum Symposium in 2011 or the listing in the Scott and Mystic catalog references recited earlier.

I suspect that the correct reference is that Parcel Post Postage Due stamps were not valid for regular mail, but only for regular postage due (at least that would make sense to me) but the post office has been known to do stranger things.

But if that's the true case, then both the Scott and Mystic catalogs are wrong in their comments!

I just did some additional research to find the 1913 ruling that covered these US Parcel Post and Parcel Post Postage Due stamps. Here's the summary of what was published in The Postal Record for 1913 under Postmaster General Order #7241:



If I read this accurately, the Parcel Post Postage Due Stamps were, as I first thought, only valid for the postage due use:

"the regular issue of due stamps and the distinctive parcel post due stamps shall be valid for the collection of unpaid and short-paid postage for all classes of mail."

Unless I'm missing something, it would seem that both the Mystic and Scott Stamp Catalogs have errors in the statement used to describe the usage of these stamps after the so-called "exclusive use" period.