Perth Amboy evening news., 1919-05-03
~89$
CLOGGING THE MAILS

LLOOO4IN0 AAA
Tn ppboldinp the right Of Colonel John Fl. Wigmore to frank
thousands of letters favoring the retention of the present army court
martial, and incidentally criicising Senator Chamberlain for attack
ing on the floor of the senate the administration of the law. Attorney
General Palmer and Postmaster General Burleson have given official
approval to one of the greatest abuses of the mails to be found IN ts
country. being one of the reasons for the terrible congestion IN M on
ferent terminals causing unnecessary delay for legitimate mail. =
Tho mai; received at the EVENING NEWS office is a fair sample
rhat h ernm frank means int the handling of mail through
out the country these days. On an average of twenty letters a day' an
sent as first class mail, are received, all under government Hank'
which means that no postage is required These letters come from the
varims depattments of the government containing all kinds of propa-
ganda, from the booming of the Victory loan under the auspices OF the
Treasury Department to the establishment of school gardens packed
by the Department of Agriculture. Then all the labor boards traoe
commissions. housing propositions and the thousand and one other
branches of the government established for war purposes II senonns
out every day thousands of letters under government frank pushing
their various projects.
Of course, there is no limit to the number OF letters That al d
mailed as long as no postage is required, yet it costs the Post Office
Department Just as much to handle these franked letters as it does the
legitimate mail of the country. But in order to meet the additional
cost of handling this vast volume of useless stuff Postmaster General
Bureson sees fit to curtail the postal service at just the time when the
mails are unusually flooded, in order to save money so as to create a
surplus for his department.
Besides all the departments, commissions and boards that are
flooding the mails with their stuff, there are the congressman and
senator's who also enjoy the franking privilege for socaned official
business. This includes the Sending out of hundreds of thousands OF
copies of their speeches to people all over the country, speeches
that are seldom read by anyone, but which not only tend to clog the
mails, but are printed at great expense at the government printing
ofsee, not to -ation tbs white paper eonSn@ed for which 60 safN :
@-~~ I@&A1- T.,
payers eventually have to pay. i
Then, add to this privilege enjoyed by congressman and sen A
ators besides all the departments, commissions, boards and other
branches of the government, the privilege that has just been upheld
by the attorney general and the postmaster general Of an army Of
fcer using the government frank to send out thousands of letters peril
tanning to some army regulation in which he is interested, and multi
ply it a thousand times so as to apply equally to all army officers, and
you begin to get some idea of the load the post office is carrying with
out a cent of income and for which the legitimate mail of the country
must pay in addition to being held up and delayed because of the
food of this useless government stuff, nine-tenths of which goes i'm
mediately into the scrap basket. /
While the first requisite for restoring the mails to normal eondi
tins is the removal Of Burleson and the abandonment of his slavish
and penurious methods one of the first reforms after Burleson has
gone should be to take away from the numerous boards, commissions
and individuals the privilege of franking letters, thereby doing away
with much of the congestion that is the cause of SO much delay in
the handling of the mail. -