The Minneapolis journal. [volume] (Minneapolis, Minn.) 1888-1939, 1903-12-05

it will cost the government, ACCORDING
to present estimates, $47,0O0,OOO for
all the home delivery Of mails, or as
much as the entire postal establish
ment cost in 1884. And all kinds of
letter carriers want more pay.
;. The present compensation of $500 a
year for rural carriers, altho double
that which it was estimated would be
necessary when the service was estab-
lished, has proved so Inadequate IN
certain places that Mr.. Bristow thinks
congress should raise it to $3.50 for
the twenty-five-mile routes. Even
there uniformity is clumsy. Twenty
five miles across mountainous coun-
try would wear out horses more than
double that distance on the level corn
field lands Of Indiana.
i A number of bills to raise rural sal
aries have already been introduced,
some Of them even suggesting rates as
high as 5000. The fact that 10 per
cent of the carriers resigned during
the last year, nearly all of them as
signing inadequate compensation as
the case, strengthens this appeal for
better pay.
The department acknowledges, how
ever, that it is only in certain parts
of the country that this consideration
operates. Where the feed of horses
is expensive, or labor high, or both,
pow rs nov tllOuS1l W 1AldlA IAS SEW
ice, while in the grazing regions Of
Tennessee and Arkansas and Missouri,
competition for places at the present
rate is intense.
Carriers Do Other Business.
Rural carriers are now allowed to do
an express business, and the law is SO
broad as to permit of many abuses.
Business firms secure the distribution
Of large quantities of advertising mat
ter by the rural carriers without It's
touching the postal establishment at
all. They ship 1t by freight or express
to the carrier direct, who distributes
it while ION government time, thus
depriving Uncle Sam of revenue which
would naturally be his, and really de-
feating the interests Of the service.
In certain sections rural carriers
have become agents for newspapers,
and this has led to the charge of
one state an organization of carriers
attempted to exact certain .compensa-
| ton from the daily papers, putting any
publication that declined to meetswtth
| its request, on a sort Of blacklist.
To cure such troubles as these, Mr..
Bristow wishes to prohibit carriers
from doing outside business. Others
advocate Uncle Sam doing the very
| things for all patrons alike. which his
rural agent is so strongly. pressed to
do on private account.
| If the rural carrier continues to
press for the opportunity to convey
express parcels for private companies
the question naturally arises why
should he not carry them for the gov
eminent? In a fight that has for
years been going on here between the
express companies and those who
favor the parcel post, it is safe to say
| that no weapon SO powerful has ever
| before been put into the latter hands
as the rural delivery.
The objection to the parcels pos
! In the city has been that carriers are
| too heavily loaded now and the gov.
eminent would either have to operate
/ another corps or put wagon service
on every route.
i This was a practical objection from
i the urban viewpoint but in the coun.
try 1t is vanishing. The wagon Is al,
j ready there and It's load is extremely
light.
i II the express companies, with thi.
/ popular argument against them, car
continue to hold the four-pound limi
d In our postal regulations, and the
lridiculously high rate of Is cents {
pound on merchandi Use, when 1t Is be
i lieved half that rate would increas,