The Yale expositor. (Yale, St. Clair County, Mich.) 1894-current, 1915-05-27
POSTAL SAVINGS SYSTEM

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Every person in the United States
ten years old or over may open an
account in postal savings bank af-
| ter July LIST. according to an instruc-
tive leafet on the postal savings sys-
TEN just issued by Postmaster Gen
eral Burleson. This important tx
tension of the service will be made
possible by permitting persons liv-
ing in communities so sparsely set
tied as not to justify the designation
of their local postofIices as regular
| postal savings banks to open ac-
counts by mail.
Governor Dockery, third assistant
postmaster General, who has direct
| supervision of postal savings, was so
impressed by appeals from all over
the country to open postal savings
accounts by mail that he took up the
| task some weeks ago of working out
feasible and safe method for meet
| ing demand well illustrated in a
| letter from Saline county Missouri
| ian, who resides many miles from a
postal savings bank.
Having a few hundred dollars saw
| ed from fifty years Of hard and as
siduOus labor and skimping economy
on the part Of my wife and myself,
we concluded to deposit it in the
postal savings bank of . We
wrote to the postmaster at that place
and received reply TO the effect that
none but patrons of that Office could
deposit in that Office which is very
disappointing news to us. Our little
90 l.. l., -,
us and land is so high that it is I'M
possible for us to buy more with
what little we have saved and we are
so old that we can't labor much now
and we would be so glad to lay by
at least enough to put us away in
decency."
Under the plan adopted by the
postmaster general for opening ac-
counts by mail an intending deposit
tor, residing where there is no regu-
larry designated postal savings bank,
will apply to his local postmaster who
will see that necessary Identification
data is prepared and forwarded to a
nearby postoifice authorized to ac-
cept deposits. The intending de-
positor will then be given permission
| to forward his first and subsequent
deposits by money order or register
| ed mail direct to the postmaster at
the banking point for which receipts
or certificates will be issued. He may
withdraw all or part of his postal
savings by mail and on demand to-
gether with any interest that may
| be due him.
The new leaflet points out that any
person ten years old or over may
open an account in his or her own
name; that an account may be open
ed by a married woman free from
any control or interference by her
| husband; that postofiice officials are
| forbidden to disclose to any person,
except the depositor the amount of
any deposits; that Withdrawals may
! be made without previous notice; and
that the government guarantees to
repay all deposits on demand with
accrued interest.
The leahet will soon be printed in
% foreign languages for distribution
through local postofiices. The for
eign-born citizen has taken very kind
| ly to postal savings, and literature in
his own language will be of great
assistance to him. In a recent arti-
Gle, Postmaster General Burleson
commented on the foreign-born de-
positor as follows:
Upwards of 100000 depositors now
have accounts in the postal savings
system and they represent every ma
tionality on the earth They also rep
resent almost every known occupa-
tion-profession men, theatrical peo-
pie, mechanics, laborers, fishermen,
pack peddlers. etc. But the major
ity are wage-earners, and of this class
the foreign-born largely predominant.
A census of depositors taken by the
postoffice department shows that APP
proXimately 40 per cent (2O0,OOO) OF
the depositors are foreign-born citi-
zens and they own more than 30 per
cent of the eposits-splendid evil
dence of the confidence of our newly
acquired citizens in the ability and
good faith of their adopted country
to fulfill its obligations.
There is another reason which led
immigrants, unfamiliar with our
language and business methods, to
turn to the government to safeguard
their humble savings and that reason
is the disastrous experiences many OF
them have had by the failures Of
bogus private banks" Differed by
swindlers of their own tongue who
have prayed mercilessly upon their
loneliness and credulity"
Postal savings receipts have brok-
en- all records the past year. During
the Fights months prior to April LIST
there was a net gain in deposits Of
fnc CT mi &
100000 for the same months the
year before. Thousands of new ac-
counts have been opened and the mil
lions made up largely of hidden saw
ings have been turned back into the
channels of trade just at time when
there was~pressing demand for every
dollar.