Raftsman's journal. [volume] (Clearfield, Pa.) 1854-1948, 1855-07-04
T[lg RARRgElAGlog OOURlAGa
POST OFFICE MIs-MANAGEMENT.


We last week published an account of the
gross carelessness of some of the Post Office
officials. resulting in the loss of valuable let
ters containing large remittances We OBJ
serve that the subject is receiving the atten-
tion Of the public, and that the exposures
which have recently been made are bringing
out the facts We have long suspected these
developments, and are, therefore, not surpri-
zed even at their generally unlooked-for mag
nanimitv. Circumstances have occurred with
in our own knowledge, sufficient to convince
us not only of the utter inability and ineffi-
cheney of some of the employees of the Gov
ernment,-but OF their absolute dishonesty.
In addition to the two cases which we pub
lished last week, we d large number of
others given in our exchanges, of about equal
purport. For example IA late clerk in the
Boston Post Office says, that about four years
since he was requested by the Chief Clerk IN
that Office, to examine the waste paper IN the
cellar of that Office, to if any missing let
ters could be found there. The result of the
examination was the bringing TO light Of from
eighteen to twenty-five letters, containing large
remittences of money, several of which were
addressed to some Of the heaviest houses in
the city.
But it is not only the carclessness of the
officials that gives just cause of complaint
Recent events have developed a most outra-
geous system of espionage, by which the Sc
cret agents take the liberty to take letters out
of the mail bags, melt the waters with steam,
read and copy the contents. seal up the viola
ted epistlcs and then send them forward again
1t is true that the Head of the Department
declares, that this Is unauthorized, but how
comes it to have been done with their know
ledge, and without objection
In recent case at New Orleans, Judge
McCaleb, in his charge to the Grand Jury, de-
nounced this iniquitOus espionage in the most
| emphatic language. He at the same time
pointed out the penalty which attached to a
violation OF the sanctity with which the law
has clothed every communication from one
citizen to another, when once sealed and de-
posted in the Post Office. :: 80 officer or
agent of the Government said the Judge,
| q any more than a private citizen, has right
to open letter once sealed and confded to
the Department. No high functionary of the
Government has any authority to delegate such
a right or privilege to subordinate agent.
| :. call your attention TO this subject the
more earnestly, because there seems to be a
| strange and most erroneous impression enter
taned by some persons employed in the ser
| vice of the Post Office Department in regard
to their peculiar rights and privileges. The
law, gentlemen, draws no distinctions between
individuals, and l have no hesitation in say
ing that the moment agent of the Post
| Office Department, or any other person, 5iares
to violate the sanctity of private correspon-
dcnce, by opening a letter once entrusted to
| the Post Office, no matter for what purpose,
he is guilty of an offence in the eye of the law,
and renders himself subject to the penalties
which that law has prescribed. 1t would be
strange indeed if any person should. under the
pretext or for the. purpose of detecting a
crime, be permitted to perpetrate with i'm
punity another crime equally infamous and
equally forbidden by the law.''