The Corvallis gazette. [volume] (Corvallis, Or.) 1862-1899, 1881-05-20
STAR MAIL ROUTES

feet that great frauds have been per p
in the mail department :" =
.-ainst the treasury of the United h
'tates. Il
These mis,lemeanorsa appear to- have :
in ceasracts naadein the STAR :
., ,,te service. According TO the m 4
.,,nation, eivea, thus, far receivea,
.,.:te a numherof officials who haze,
occupied high positions at Washing
I,,u. together with other persons IN
i '..rent parts of the United States
arr, rompllc tied in these matters.
'~",ese violations of public faith, by
With the National treasury was de-
nj .,..l, have been effected by con-
tr: c, for weekly service on many OF
t,h star mail routes. taken by irrs71
sp,,nsihle straw bidders at prices se'
low hat it precludes all honest bff-
ding. after mlpiclsa agents of the de-
frau lrrs were sent ont to notify the
few people who were to he fenrsi on
each route, that they did not have
mail service enough, and to urge them
to sign petitions, which the instlga
tors of the scheme had prepared, ask
ing Congress TO increase the mall SER
vice on each particular ronte.-
IF genuine signers conld not be
procured, names were to be hal any
how: as we are-led to infer from m
etructions sent to one of these agents,
giving directions in regard to eprocn-
ring signatures to petitions m which
the principal wrote to- tile agent as
follows: "You want the wording
well as the hand writing of' each per-
son to he as-different as possible
Tn order to appreciate the enormity
of this steal, aud to give better idea
of.the country where these 'swindles
were perpetrated, we give ssafollow-
.ing;routes which were manipulated
and. the pay greatly increased as foh
lows: On the route from Eugene to
Bridge Creek, by the way OF PrinSille,
Oregon, new contracsawas snbstitu-
ted for the old one made under the
straw bid, and the pay increased
from S2,46s, to SCI ,46o per annum
In like manner, the pay on the Look
ing Glass route was increased from
$500 to sl3,7s5 per year, and from
the Dalles to Bake! City, Oregon, By
way of Canyon City, the price fo1
carrying over this route wassinrreas
ed from $s,2ss to s72, $50 per annHm
to be carried six times per week, ant
at the same time, when this contrac
was being made, route over which
the mails were regularly carried, ex
isted, running parallel with the on
in question, which extended ifrom,th
Dalles to Baker City, via Pendleton
and La Granda. On the route from
Canyon City to Camp McDermotl
most OF the way through a eountr
without populations tho pay was II
creased from s2,ssS to $2f,5oo; an
Een the Dalles to Lake View, j
southern Oregon, it was increase
from g., ,0ss TO $40, 800.
ALI persons who are acquainte
with the various portions of conntr
through which the several route
above pamed extend, are aware I
the fact that those localities are spar
ly populated, and it is probable tn
en- all other routes where this syste
of thievery has been carried on,
will be found that they exter
through similar portions of countr;
= Under the advice of president Ga
field. Postmaster General James h
been making the necessary investie
tions preparatory to bringing the p'
petrators Of these misdeeds to justis
When these Investigations we
first instituted, some of the offer
ers made various threats to the efk
that they had in their possession a
wonld produce certain letters WRIT
.
by the president, the effect of viii
would criminate him in the matt
These threats were no doubt ma
for the purpose of effecting pub
sentiment in their favor and agail
the president to frighten him i
withdrawing such Investigations
order to save himself from anotl
blackmailing scheme like the fore
Morey letter.
Finding that they could not Il
put stop to the investigations, u
have failed to produce any such
dence for the good reason that u
never did have it and such lett
were never written.
Its safe to conclude that Carl
will still insist upon these investi
x;one bo;no made until the Derpe,