St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1895-10-25
UNITED STATES LETTER CAR
RIERS IN A NEW
ROLE.
STREET RAILWAY COMPANY
SECURES THEIR SERVICES TO
LOOK UP ACCEPTABLE MEN
FOR JURORS.
CAPT. HARDAcRE,s MISTAKE.
JeOpardizes His Position, Ia a Mo-
lnenf of ThOughtIessness, for
the Corporation.

&c w. T1drQdcre, Superlntend-
ent of the free delivery of the St.
Paul postoffice, is next to the oldest
official in point of service in connec-
ton with the postal service in this
city. For the first time in his official
career Capt. Hardacre is in trouble.
Just how deep he is into it he does
MT know. If the matter is referred
up to Washington it may cost him
his position. If it is allowed to go
with the reprimand that Postmas-
ter Castle administered to him and
any additional censure the postmas-
ter may impose, Capt. Hardacre will
consider himself lucky man.
Capt. Hardacre's trouble is due to
an act of thoughtlessness, he claims,
and those who know the facts believe
this to be true. But he so thor
oughly appreciates the fact that it
was such a breach of all the rules
and laws Of the postal department
that when he thinks of it he won
ders how in the world he was ever
led into committing it, A few days
ago an officer of the ST. Paul city
railway company called on Capt.
Hardacre and told him about the
large number of damage suits it
had to defend. The officer told him
how everybody who could was i'm
posing on the company in this way;
that some of the people took chances
of getting hurt in order to be able
to bring suits against the company
and a whole lot more of alleged
facts of that sort. The street rail-
way company was willing to pay
all just damage claims, but didn't
want to be compelled to pay unjust
claims by the greedy public. 1t was
therefore to the interests of the
company to get good men to serve
on juries. They didn't want any
the best Of it, neither did they want
any the worst of it. Wouldn't
Capt. Hardacre ask his carriers to
try and ascertain the standing of a
to serve on juries; find out quietly
how these men stood in their re-
spective communities, and so on?
. The street railway officer repeated
again and again to the captain that he
did not want to use it against any man
who had a case against the company,
but simply to be able to pick good
jurors. Without thinking that the
fundamental and all the other rules
governing the postoffice department is
that the service is intended to be used
wholly and entirely for the distribu-
ton and collection of mail, and that
they are not to hunt up or give out
any information about any man on
any subject, Capt. Hardacre said to
the street railway man, "Why, certain
ly, I'll do that for you. I'll have the
carriers find out what you want
The st. Paul street railway officer
went away happy. Capt. Hardacre sat
down and wrote a, bulletin, pasting the
names of the best of prospective jurors
on it, with the additional instruction
that the carriers were requested to
make quiet inquiries in the several
communities where these men lived
about their standing and veracity, and
report them to him. He then posted
this on the bulletin board, and later in
the day called the attention of the car
riers to the bulletin. He thought no
more about the matter, except to take
the reports whsch the men turned in,
and which he intended to give to the
street railway company. 1t may be eX-
planned here that the legal department
of the company was in no way con-
nected with this movement to enlist
the entire $50 United States mail car
riers of the city Of St Paul in the
secret service of the ST. Paul Street
Railway company. The legal depart
ment not only did not figure in it in
any way, but had no connection with
ut, directly or indirectly.
AS stated above, Capt. Hardacre be-
gan to accumulate some of the infor-
nation which the street railway COM
pany desired to use, but it never
reached the street railway. Some of
the people who were being quizzed by
the carriers about some Of their neigh
bors began to wonder what it was all
about. They talked it over and finally
1t reached the ears of g, number of at
torneyS, among them c. D. O'Brien,
Thomas T. Fauntleroy and Edwin A.
Jaggard. To say that such a move on
the part of the street railway COM
pany made these gentlemen displeased
puts it mildly. To learn that Can't.
Hardacre had lent the services of the
force Of letter carriers in ST. Paul to
carry out the wishes of the company
simply added fuel to the flames of
their wrath
These three gentlemen after talking
the matter over called on Postmaster
Castle, and there began the disruption
of the plans of the officer of the street
railway company. Postmaster Castle
hadn't heard what his carriers were
doing and before the seance was over,
a white heat Capt. Hard
acre was called in, told the story and,
after learning that the postmaster
had a pretty concise idea of what
the postoffice was for and
what it was not for, and that the
act was not only very
irregular but displeasing, Capt. Hard
acre apologized to the postmaster, to
the attorneys, and went out and de-
stroyed the information which the let
ter carriers had turned in on the SUBJ
ject. The delegation of attorneys left,
and since that the superintendent of
the free delivery service has spent his
spare moments thinking over why he
was so unwise as to be induced by a
good strong talk to place his position
in jeopardy. Whether or not the Of
ficials at Washington have been ad-
vised of the matter is not known, but
1t was said yesterday that it would be
laid before the authorities sooner or
later.
Postmaster Castle was seen by re-
porter for the G | o b yesterday, and
asked what We're the facts in the case
: ''The first 1 heard of it, replied the
postmaster was the. other day when
a delegation Of lawyers came in and