St. Paul daily globe., 1895-12-09
HE EXPLAINS HIS WORK,
AND CITES CASES WHERE THE
PUBLIC GAINED INFORMA-
TION TOO SOON.
ORDERS AGAINST l.,
LOBBYING.
General Wilson'S Lat
est Not Construed as Aimed at
Clerks Organizations.


ters, the first being an account of the
dismissal of William w. Hill, assist
ant superintendent of the free de-
livery department.; Samuel Beight,
of Indiana, a clerk in this depart
ment, and William A. Sullivan, of
Boston, a clerk of the dead-letter
office, for giving out official infor-
nation, and conspiring to belittle
the government. The dismissals
caused a sensation and resulted from
an investigation of some weeks that
has been carried on by First AS
sistant Postmaster General Jones.
Hill is an old employe, and for sew
eral years has been, aside from his
duties as assistant superintendent
of the free delivery, a special COM
missioner to investigate the over
time claims of the letter carriers of
the service, and in this capacity
visited st. Paul a short time ago.
Postmaster Castle was shown the
dispatch last night, and in COM
menting upon it, said: yes, this
is the same Hill who was here sew
eral weeks looking up the overtime
claims in the st. Paul office. l don't
know whether the public understands
the Overtime claim" matter or not
so L will state it briefly. Some eight
years ago congress passed a law
limiting the carriers work to eight
hours per day, or fifty-siX hours per
week of seven days. There was no
general delivery Sundays, and as the
carriers did about two hours work
the law was so construed by the pos
tai authorities that they divided the
remaining six hours among the days
of the week remaining, and so COM
PEELED the carriers to work nine
hours for six days and two hours on
the seventh. The carriers finally or
ganiZed, and a case was started in
the courts, and was carried to the
United States supreme court, where
it was decided against the govern
ment, and the ruling was that, in
working nine hours a day each car
rier had simply worked an hour eX-
ira. Some Of them had been doing
the nine hours per day for seven or
eight years, and in order to find out
who these men are, a commissioner
was appointed to investigate the
records of each postoffice, and Hill
was the man.
After being out a few weeks on
this commission work he W6tild' go
back to his office in Washington for
"a time. Now, I do not know what
his particular offense is in this case,
but l do know after he left here he
went to Chicago and worked there
for some time prior to his return to
Washington. Soon after he got back
a Chicago newspaper sprung a SEN
sation by publishing three-column-
dispatch from their Washington~cor-
respondent, in which he gave big
story of the secret inveStigati ation by
spoilers" of the carriers work in
Chicago, and stated that out of some
1,5OO men nearly 400 would be called
upon to explain irregularities in
their official conduct. The informa
ton was in advance by several days
of the official report of the work of
the spoilers, and for time it was
a mystery as to how the correspond
ent had gotten hold Of it. 1 don't
know that it is explained yet, but
this case of Hills may clear it up"
"While Hill was investigating the
overtime claims was he spotting
the work of the carriers, too?" was
asked by the reporter.
mo, sir, Hill had nothing to do with
that directly" replied Capt. Castle,
"but inasmuch as he was the assistant
superintendent of this department, the
spoilers reports all came into his
hands. In ST. Paul the spoilers re-
port that seventeen men would be
charged with irregularity, was pub
lished. as you know, in the daily
papers. and that some four or five
days before 1 was officially notified of
it from Washington. l see, too, con-
tinued the postmaster, that Hill is
charged with 'belittling the govern
ment' This may mean that he was
trying to supplant the chief of the
free delivery bureau, A. w. Mechen,
who is an honest, hardworking Off
cial, and an able man, or it may mean
that he was furnishing congressman
with secret information, which would
be used against the administration,
which has been done. At all events,
this telegram would indicate that the
transactions of his office have been
thoroughly unsatisfactory to his SUI
periors."
Capt. Castle was then questioned
about the second of the kilograms
which was that Postmaster General
Wilson had issued an order notifying
all employees against organizing TO Sc
cure legislation or pooling to send rep
resentatives to appear before congress
sional committees in behalf of legisla-
ton, on the penalty of dismissal from
the service.
'Is not this a slap at the recent
postal convention held in this city,"
was the question asked.
mo, 1 should not SO take it, re-
piled Capt. Castle, as he laid down the
telegram, "for the postofffce depart
ment is in favor of certain class of
legislation. For instance, it strongly
commends a bill establishing the
classification of clerks in first-class
Offices which was pending last con-
gress, but did not go through. In
January, 1895, there was a convention
of postmasters held, in the city of
Washington with the full knowledge
and approval of the postmaster gen
eral, who granted those attending
leave of absence from official duries.
Some ten or twelve of the leading
cities were represented, New York
Brooklyn, Philadelphia, Baltimore.
Pittsburg, Chicago and st. Paul, and
while we were in session we went,
with the consent and further approval
of the postmaster general, before a
committee of the house of representa-
tives and strongly urged the passage
of this bill The committee of the
house was Democratic, as was the
congress, and all the postmaSters eX-
cept myself Democrats, but the COM
mittee declined to recommend the
passage of the bill, OH the ground that
it's enforcement, if a law, would re-
quire an additional appropriation for
postal services. They are still anX-
ious to have the bill passed and will
back 1t again if it comes up III this
sesSion of congress, as it no doubt will.