Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1922-01-08
Hays Aims to Take
Department Out
of Politics.
Sees a Splendid Future
With Every Employe
Up On His Toes.
aY CHARLES z. TRAcEwELL.

BIZ C6A11ES y. SHACGWE1L.
!HosTMAsTER GENERAL HAYS.
- in "humanizing" the postal
service, has done two great
things. He has taught the
American people not to be ashamed Of
being good. And he has set in motion
forces which he believes will result
some day in the selection Of the postal
head directly from the ranks Of the
100000 postal workers.
There is something about the av-
erage American mind which shrinks
from a public display of morals. To
talk about righteousness with familiar
ity simply lays one open to the charge
Of hypocrisy. Maybe we have been
fed up" on too much "goody-goody"
business in our youth.
But when a strong man. although
Small of body, <comes preaching the
Golden Rule like a prophet of old and
with daily efforts of eighteen hours at
a time succeeds in exemplifying it in
hard cash. the country stands at at
tention.
Now back in the head of the POST
master General. and. l understand. in
the back of the head of President
Harding. turks big idea. 1t is that
some day the 100000 workers in the
postal service will be able to produce
their own Postmaster General.
Mr.. Hays believes that the postal
service is too Big business to be used
as political plaything for ever. Much
as Napoleon melted his soldiers to tri-
umph after triumph by telling them
that in every private's knapsack was
Of such. so Mr.. Hays would tell every
mail carrier that in his mail sack lies
the possibilities Of a commission as
Postmaster General. of the United
This is the big hope and dream Of
the present Postmaster General. A
politician born and bred in the school
of Indiana politics. her fekiiSes better;
than anybody else, perhaps. that the
day is coming when the gigantic bust
ness of Uncle Sans postal service
must be divorced from politics. He
sees the handwriting on the wall
He has no kick" against politics.
But he feels that the great postal serv-
Ice. which he has come to love In the
ten months he has been it's head, is no
place for the politician to play his
proper trade in. To put 1t another way,
he thinks that the sooner the postal
service gets out of politics, the bet
ter for the postal service and for poll
tics, too.
He found the very first thing for
him to do was to change the spirit of
the men and women doing the work of
the service, the men on mail trains,
the carriers on their routes, the men
and women clerks in offices. Even the
postmasters needed to be made feel
that they, too, were human beings
among human beings, not just so many
cogs in big wheel.
The new postal head saw that he
could do nothing of any worth, either
for the postal service or for the ma
ton, until he made every man and
woman in the postal business feel
that they were real men and women,
engaged in a big job. He wanted
them all to know that the postal
head believed in them. relied upon
them, and was standing behind them,
one and all. and wanted them, one
and all, to stand behind him
So he went at that job with such
energy that soon his "humanizing
business" was spread over the papers
of the country.
He shook hands with employees on
every occasion; he published in his
Postal Bulletin the names and deeds
Of those rendering meritorious serv-
Ice: he established a welfare council