The Madison daily leader. [volume] (Madison, S.D.) 1890-current, 1903-12-03

it. There are men In the civil service
machine today who know more about
post Office affairs in their own depart
ments than any outsider could possibly
know who would like to make i'm
proyements. Why can't they! Simply
because the real directors of the post
office have been the members of the
committee on post offices ana post
roads in the house of representatives.
Congress must necessarily decide the
policy OF the post Office. but 1t Is a be-
wildering complication Of an institu-
ton, already complex. to have some of
its most powerful quasi officials In a
house committee
Instead of working on business prin-
ciples the post Office machine Is gov
erned by bulky book Of laws that
has grown from the slim book Of 1874
as fast as successive congresses have
cared to pass postal bills. Rates of
postage are changed. service is rem
dered. contracts are made under regu-
lations passed by men dead for genera
tions, whose laws were made for
post office which as late as 1873 cost
in total expenditures only what it costs
now for the single item of railroad
transportation. The post office depart
ment may recommend until ii is weary,
and these laws do not bulge Con-
gress-and that means chiefly the
house post Office committee says
what the post Office shall do and shall
not do | once asked high post office
official why he failed to carry out
plan he had to save perhaps the total
amount OF the post Office deficit on
certain contracts. He shrugged his
shoulders.
"Why bump ones head against
stone wally saM he. Congress won't
pass it,"
Every plan that has ever been pre-
sented TO congress for improving the
postal service" said high post Office
authority, has been scrutinized by in
terests. Do you suppose we can have
revision changing the present rates
of paying the railroads as long as some
of the most prominent senators and
portation interests!'
l turned to another official.
'Do you mean," said /, that you
could not pass bill obnoxious to in
terestsr'
We'll" and he smiled diplomatically
'there would certainly be opposition"
Finally there is the civil service sys-
tenn. Ii post Office official fulfills his
routine duties he rises in the service
by sheer mechanism. Once in berth
it requires a trial for gross inefficiency
or misconduct to get him out. Ii the
miasma of an office where there is no
spur of self interest tO7goad a man to
effort fails to stifie his progressiveness,
sophistication tells him that 1t is un-
wise to arouse an interest. Not too
much zeal" is watchword in the
United States post office. Even If the
head of department wished to have
force as efficient as that demande
by the manager Of business. he could
not have it.
Tiny Switzerland has many things to
teach us. So have Germany, France
and England.
In German city-take Berlin, for
example-there Is post Office every
few hundred yards. A post Office can
be found as easily as a cigar store in
New York. A network of underground
tubes connects all but the very small
est. Ordinary mail goes from station
to station by government owned wag-
ons. but special delivery card or
stamp, costing less than s cents. will
cause a message to be shot by tube
anywhere in the city. A messenger
will carry it from the point OF recep-
ton the few necessary yards to the
receiver and will wait for an answer.
Message and answer in Berlin take
about two hours. This is service far
speedier than any In the United States.
The German telegraph system is an
adjunct OF the post Office. kilograms,
costing II cents for ten words includ-
ing address, beat special delivery let
ters by just the margin between cleo
tric and pneumatic transmission. Postal
checks for small amounts almost Who'll
ly take the place of bank checks. One
may send postal money order with
message written on the back, and a
postal messenger will bring 1t TO the
house of the receiver and pay it there
on the spot, service as accurate and
complete as by personal messenger.
Subscription to magazines and news
papers is through the post office. You
pay the postmaster, he orders the prop
er number Of publications for his Of
flee, and the journals co ne cheaply and
smoothly in bulk to the several sta
tions for delivery. And not only does
parcels post do practically all the
German express business at low rates,
depending on weight and distance, but
Germany, through agreements with
other nations, sends parcels around
the world. | know a resident of Berlin
who has package of meat mailed TO
him every Saturday from point 100
miles away in Silesia for little more
than l. cents, the rate for twenty
pound parcel. German merchants de-
liver most Of their goods by mail. the
small storekeeper thus provided with
as good delivery service as the lar
ger. All the parcels, large and small,
are brought of course to the address
to which they are directed. Germans
b,ro avap haao narmftta1 IN mail