The Leon reporter. (Leon, Iowa) 1887-1930, 1916-02-10
REIMBURSEMENT or ROUTES.

REIMBURSEMENT OF ROUTES.
Gives Service to Three Thousand Adj
tlitional Families Communication
from Postoffice Department.
Noting the acclaim of dissatisfac-
ton with the REIMBURSEMENT Of the ru-
raj routes, and the industry with
are at work fostering discomfort
be turned into ballot grist at the cleo
ton will next fall, and having deep
seated feeling that there is nothing in
the administration of the postoftice de-
partment that is intendent to willful-
ly hurt any citizen and taxpayer nor
even inconvenience them unless by so
doing more citizens can be convenient
ed than inconvenienced, the editor OF
the Centerville Journal addressed
letter to the Postmaster General and
asked for such data on the mail route
matter that would be of interest to
those citizens who may have been al
fected by the mail route changes. A
prompt reply was received from the
Fourth Assistant Postmaster Gener
containing considerable data, all OF
which could not be published at one
time. Among the data, however,
which was enclosed was the copy OF
a letter which was written recently to
a citizen of Iowa and which bears
upon the readjustment of the Iowa
routes. We trust that all of those
readers of the Reporter who are inter-
ested in the rural routes will read
the following letter from the Fourth
Assistant Postmaster General, and
note carefully the fact that in the re-
adjustment 5000 families in the state
of Iowa are now receiving rural mail
delivery who before were obtaining
no rural service at all, and the fur
Their fact that is set forth in the clos
ing paragraph of the letter, which
bears GU the statement contained In
a recent editorial in the Centerville
Journal to the effect that the local
postmasters made reports on the
routes, before the changes were
made. In this county the local post
master in the town having the most
to do with the mail service of the
county happened to be republican
at the time the change was recon-
mended. Following is the letter from
the Fourth Assistant Postmaster Cen
eral:
December "a, 1915.
My Dear Sir:
have delayed reply to your COM
munication of the 18th instant until
was in position to furnish you with
data that will, no doubt, be very in
teresting to the farmers of Iowa.
This data is forwarded herewith,
and am also sending you under sep
arate cover 100 copies of pamphlet
containing speeches made by me be-
fore the convention of the National
Association of Postmasters of the first
and second classes, in this city, and
before the State Association of Post
masters, at Saginaw, Michigan, in
which will be found the reasons which
necessitated proper readjustment of
the collection and delivery service on
rural routes.
You will notice from the enclosed
tabulated record of service rendered
by certain rural carriers in the state
of Iowa, that in nearly every instance
the individual carriers performed less
than four hours Of actual service
daily during more than three-f0urths
VI tue year. e1uu I1dC III AuAOAOuo AZ
stances the carriers performed less
man four hours of service throughout
the entire year, and in many cases
but two and one-half or three hours
of daily work was performed. This
declaration only refers to the car
riers who travel more than twenty
miles per day and who receive in ex-
cess of $1,000 per annum. Should
their compensation be calculated at a
rate per hour, they would in many
cases be paid as high as 81 an hour,
and do not believe that any such re-
turn is expected, or received, by the
rural or mercantile pursuits.
This bureau does not resent the fact
that an individual employee is paid
unusual compensation, but there are
thousands of other postal employees
in the state of Iowa, including clerks
in post offices, city letter carriers, and
railway postal clerks, who perform
eight hours of work daily, and we
contend that there is an unfair dis
elimination in any method of COM
pensation that permits one man to re-
ceive the same salary for two hours
work that another man receives for
eight hours of similar labor. Even in
the rural delivery service there are
hundreds of carriers in Iowa who
work eight hours daily on poor roads,
collecting and distributing from five
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