The Cass County Republican. [volume] (Dowagiac, Mich.) 18??-1880, 1860-03-01

M8ndsemeut Oh the FOstsOmCc DcPuHs-
ment...Speech of the Hon. z. Chandler,
of Michigan.
Delivered in the U. s. Senate, Wednesday, Feb.
Is, 1900
Mr.. CHANDLER. Mr.. President. the
Senator from Maine has pointed out
few of the reasons why the POST Office
Department is not self-sustaining; but
he has not pointed them all out, nor
any considerable number of them. In
my estimation, one chief reason OF the
great deficiency of our Post-Office re-
ceipts is owing to the system of jobbe-
ry that extends all through that De-
partment. We have this morning cut
off one great leak. We have passed
bill which will save the Post Office De-
partment some $50, 900 year on one
class of printing alone. The gross
wrong, which that bill corrects, has ex-
listed for years; it was not a wrong
that has grown up unobserved, for it
has been known to the President of the
United States and to the Postmaster
General; and yet it has been allowed
to 90 on from year to year swallowing
up the revenues of the Department.
1t is notorious that newspaper pub
lished in this city was purchased for a
portion of the patronage of one single
Job, other portions being employed to
subsidize and corrupt party organs in
other cities. | desire, on all occasions,
to use parliamentary language but in
what truthful language shall describe
such transaction, if it be not rob-
berry of the Post Office funds under
color of law? Post-Office revenues or
money in the Treasury of the United
States, are diverted from their proper
uses, to which they stand charged on
the books of the Department, to the
purchase and support of servile news
papers, with the knowledge of high
official personages. The crime-for is
it less than criminal Pts to be depre-
Gated not merely because the turpitude
at the head has a corrupting moral in
fuenee down through the long line of
officials to the lowest and most humble
in station. We have witnessed its
effects in Detroit. Our postmaster,
knowing that the Constitution was
subsidized from the Post Office blank
printing fund, and owning sound Lee
compton newspaper himself, supposed
he had perfect right to subsidize that
paper by placing it upon the revenues
of the Post-Office Department. The
example before him bewildered his
moral sense, and he created sinecures
in the Post-Office for services to his
newspaper. In process of time, his
political faith was not deemed sound,
and he was not only turned out, but
prosecuted, ostensibly, for Substituting
press in imitation of one who holds
the high office of President of the
United States.
There is another newspaper In my
city, which is not very well sustained.
1t is the leading Democratic press of
my State: but it cannot very well af-
ford to pay its editors. In that city
there is an office-I will call it an of
fice-of porter or messenger to the
post-office. 1t is salaried office, the
duties Of which are to transport the
mails from the post-office to the cars.
A gentleman connected with the Dem
ocratic Free Press is this salaried p. O.
porter. He receives 1920 a year as
porter to the post-office but he hires
cartman for $40 a month to do the
work. -Four times a year, at the end
of each quarter, he draws his $500.
and pays over his $50 to the man who
does the work. He thus pockets his
salary from the Post Office Depart
ment of 200 year, less S24O, which
he pays to the man who performs the
service. Nine hundred and sixty dol
lars per annum are therefore paid fol-
no other earthly service than the
partizan support of corrupted
press; and this is no exceptional case,
for throughout this broad land post
offices and custom-houses are made to
pay tribute for the same sycophantic
and degrading prostitution of that en-.
CINE which should diffuse both light
and truth. m
But again, sir, I have little further
experience in my State. In the sum
mer of 1857 man in the town of Lex.
ington, in the State of Michigan, was
detected of robbing the mail. 1t ap-
peared that he was deputy postmas-
ter; that is to say, the postmaster lived
some mile or two away from the Office
and deputized him to act as postmaster
under the plea that, owning the Demo
cratic paper, he must receive the reve
nues of the Office to enable him to rur
his press. The facts of the case were
set forth at the Post Office Department
How was the guilty man treated I? The
Postmaster of Lexington was removed
and the identical man who had robbed
the mail was appointed to succeed him.
l supposed that this was mere mis-
take; l supposed that they had taken
the postmaster who had been removed
for the thief, and / applied to the Post
Office Department to have the mistake
rectifed. brought the papers along
and submitted to the Postmaster Gen
eral, and said ssthis is clearly a mis-
take, and ask that it be rectifed, and
that this man be removed He said.
'svery well; l will have it investigat-
ed"
This was during the first session of
the Thirty-Fifth Congress, and some
months after the man had been detect
ed. | went to the Post Office Depart
ment from time to time, but l was
turned away and sent to one of the