Mail service

“ The Postal Service shall serve as nearly as practicable the entire population of the United States.
(b) It shall be the responsibility of the Postal Service—
(1) to maintain an efficient system of collection, sorting, and delivery of the mail nationwide;
(2) to provide types of mail service to meet the needs of different categories of mail and mail users ”

“ EARLY BRISTOL POST MARKS.
The mail services in the rural districts are not free from danger. The pitcher may have been carried to the fountain year after year without mishap, but it not infrequently becomes broken at last. In like manner the contractor for the Portishead, Clevedon, and Yatton mail cart service, after having driven over this route with immunity from accident for forty years, yet came to grief in the last week of his connection with His Majesty's mails, January, 1902. ”

“ The mailbox systems automatically add your name (i.e., the sender's return email address) , the creation date, and forward it to the recipient. If the recipient's mailbox is on another system, the message is routed through one or several networks to reach its destination. Several email services offer forwarding to fax, telex or ordinary postal service delivery. Some offer forwarding to paging services. When new mail arrives in your mailbox, messages with text like 'MAIL from [email protected]' will be displayed on your beeper's small screen. Soon, you can send electronic mail to anyone. ”

“ Nowadays an introducer of the inland parcel post service, the foreign parcel post service, an improver of the telegraph service, [Pg 14] and leader in bringing about vastly accelerated mail services throughout the country,—works of great moment, even if not comparable with Ralph Allen, John Palmer, or Rowland Hill's great achievements,—has, after forty years at the Post Office, to be contented on retirement with no more than the modest pension due to him, which will not even be continued to his nearest and dearest relative. ”

“ The company (having obtained from the government of Mexico peculiar and well-authenticated privileges, whereby they were enabled to present to the United States Post Office Department a schedule of mail service which should insure the transmission of mails between New Orleans and San Francisco in the short space of sixteen days) urged the department for a mail contract authorizing the service, which was granted, subject to an appropriation by Congress for payment. Thereupon the company commenced proceedings for putting the route into active operation. ”

“ Chapter V SERVICING THE HOME Many types of services are available to the country home owner, including rural mail delivery, the telephone and electricity. Rural mail delivery in particular is so common that, on practically every highway, mail service is secured by the placing of a mail box along the highway at the entrance to the residence. Telephone service is available along practically all the main-traveled highways and on a majority of the other types of roads. ”

“ The rural free delivery and other forms of the mail service extend to 58,000 communities, while our 10,000,000 telephones encompass 70,000. We use this instrument for all the varied experiences of life, domestic, social, and commercial. ”

“ The figure columns in the pay list should always be added up, and the total entered in ink. The distances entered in the vouchers or receipts for Mail Services should, agree with the distances entered in the variation returns.
4. Return of Variations in the Mail Service expenditure to be transmitted on the last day of each month, and to include all new contracts and Mail Services, all renewals and transfers of existing contracts, and all variations in Mail Service taking effect during the month. ”

“ The Postal Service shall maintain one or more classes of mail for the transmission of letters sealed against inspection. The rate for each such class shall be uniform throughout the United States, its territories, and possessions. One such class shall provide for the most expeditious handling and transportation afforded mail matter by the Postal Service. ”

“ After a time this matter appealed so strongly to thinking men that they decided to make a great national matter of it, and they established a wonderful mail service, and have kept lowering the rates and adding to the perfection of the service, until now hardly any one is so poor he cannot write a line to a friend, if only on a postal card. ”

“ Cunard as to the feasibility of the plan, and receiving from him an assurance that it might be carried into effect without in any way retarding the regular mail service, they are of the opinion that the necessary directions may be given for this purpose, subject to the following conditions:
“1. That the mail steamers shall not be delayed.
“2. That they shall not be required to alter the course they would otherwise have taken. ”

“ Both the West India and American Mails were ready yesterday by about noon, but what with the passengers in different and distant inns, the Packets in different places, the cartage of the mails, the purchasing of their anchors in very deep water—pilotage not one man-of-war ever goes to sea without, so dangerous is the passage—that I see very clearly we shall not gain anything in getting to sea, though the mail arrives here in the morning.... ”

“ A great deal of loss and inconvenience could be avoided, and much labor and expense saved for the postal service, if every one would see that every piece of mail sent out is properly addressed and stamped, and has a return address in the upper left-hand corner. ”

“ Although it is strictly the duty of post masters and other agents of the Department, to correct or report such errors in the mail service as may come to their knowledge, it is, nevertheless, desirable that any private citizen should inform the Department of continued neglect or carelessness in the execution of mail contracts or mismanagement in a post-office. ”

“ In nothing perhaps will the advantages now offered by the Post-office, in connection with the packet service, be more appreciated by the public than in the reduced rates of postage. The following table shows the initial rates for letters to several places abroad in 1829 and in 1884: [81] —
If we were asked to point out a mail-packet of the present day as fulfilling all modern requirements in regard to the packet service, and showing a model of equipment in the vessels as well as order in their management, we would not hesitate to name the mail-steamers plying between Holyhead and Kingstown. ”

“ In selecting modes of transportation, the Postal Service shall give highest consideration to the prompt and economical delivery of all mail. Modern methods of transporting mail by containerization and programs designed to achieve overnight transportation to the destination of important letter mail to all parts of the Nation shall be a primary goal of postal operations. ”

“ Any person, when engaged in carrying mail under contract with the Postal Service, or employed by the Postal Service, is deemed a carrier or person entrusted with the mail and having custody thereof, within the meaning of sections 1701, 1708, and 2114 of title 18. ”

“ Prior to the late sixties the railroads simply transported the mails, which were delivered at the post offices and there distributed. Accordingly, 'weight' as the basis of compensation was at the time of its adoption and long thereafter entirely adequate.
"For a few years, however, prior to 1873 the distribution of the mails in transitu had been practiced to a sufficient extent to satisfy the Post Office Department and Congress that it was a desirable innovation and a branch of the postal service that should be very much enlarged. ”

“ Railroad companies will be expected to place their mail cars at points accessible to mail messengers or contractors for wagon service. If cars are not so placed the companies will be required to receive the mails from and deliver them to the messengers or contractors at points accessible to the wagon of the messenger or contractor. ”

“ Though the state of the roads may be held to account for some of the delay, the roads must not be charged with everything. In 1799 a surveyor in the north of Scotland wrote as follows: "It is impossible to obtain any other contractors to ride the mails at 3d. out, or 1-1/2d. per mile each way. On this account we have been so much distressed with mail-riders, that we have sometimes to submit to the mails being conveyed by mules and such species of horses as were a disgrace to any public service." ”

“ It is held responsible for reasonable care in their transportation. Deductions are made for failures to perform service according to contract, and fines are imposed for delinquencies. The company is required to keep a record of all pouch mails carried on trains in charge of their employees and handled at stations where more than one regular exchange pouch is involved and no mail transfer clerk is located, and to prepare and forward shortage slips when a pouch is due and not received. ”

“ The growing commercial and industrial towns—Glasgow prominent among them—naturally desired direct mail-services, and the Post Office, using their needs as means for obtaining, not only roads kept in good condition, but sometimes entirely new roads and short cuts, declined to start such services until such routes were provided. ”

“ Upon initial assignment, such an employee shall be assigned to the least desirable route and shall attain assignment to more desirable routes by seniority. Promotions and assignments for such an employee in such position shall be based on seniority and ability. If ability be sufficient, seniority shall govern.
§1008. Temporary employees or carriers (a) A person temporarily employed to deliver mail is deemed an employee of the Postal Service and is subject to the provisions of chapter 83 of title 18 to the same extent as other employees of the Postal Service. ”

“ Spain, mail communication with, 14, 15, 16. “Speedy,” mutiny of her crew, 290, 291. Stevens, Captain, 254; how he escaped a privateer, 235, 236. Surgeons, Packet, 192, 193. Sutton, Captain, 297–300. “Swallow” captured, 70, 74. Taylor, Mr. N., 63–67. Thornton, Mr., 158. “Thynne” captured, 61. “Tom,” 227, 228. Tonningen, seizure of mails at, 165. “Townshend,” private goods found on, 198, 199; her fight with the two Americans, 227–233; beats off a privateer, 233, 234; capture of, 270. Trading, private, on the Packets, 9, 93–95 ”

“ A post master will suffer no person whatever, except his duly sworn assistants, or clerks and letter carriers, who may also have been sworn, to have access to the letters, newspapers, and packets in his office, or whatever constitutes a part of the mail, or to the mail locks or keys. ”

“ In relation to opening the mails on the Sabbath, it may be noticed that the ninth section of the “act regulating the post-office establishment” makes it the duty of the postmaster to attend to the duties of his office “every day” on which a mail shall arrive at his office, and at “all reasonable hours” on every day of the week. When a mail is conveyed on the Sabbath, it must be opened and exchanged at the offices which it may reach in the course of the day. ”

“ Today’s merchandising methods, the plethora of mass mailings subsidized by low postal rates, and the growth of the sale of large mailing lists as an industry in itself have changed the mailman from a carrier of primarily private communications, as he was in a more leisurely day, and have made him an adjunct of the mass mailer who sends unsolicited and often unwanted mail into every home. ”

“ And, if any person shall take any letter or packet, not containing any article of value, nor evidence thereof, out of a post-office, or shall open any letter, or packet, which shall have been in a post-office, or in custody of a mail carrier, before it shall have been delivered to the person to whom it is directed, with a design to obstruct the correspondence, to pry into another's business or secrets ”

“ In some of the large cities private express companies have undertaken to outstrip the Government mail carriers by affording for the prompt transmission of letters better facilities than have hitherto been at the command of the Post-Office. ”

“ When the mails are ready, they are sent from the Post-Office in various ways. Those for one or two country roads are sent to a local railway station, and taken in charge by the railway guard, who drops the bags at the different points on the line according to their address; others are carried by mail gigs under one or more private contractors, while the rest are taken [Pg 237] by country-walking postmen, who make certain journeys during the day, returning in the evening with the letters and bags they have gathered during their travels. ”

“ The habit of purchasing by mail is rapidly assuming enormous proportions in this country, and the custom has been catered to, in such a manner, that the ranchman on the plains may wear a latest style metropolitan custom-made suit, while his daughters may equip herself a la Fifth Avenue—all by inspection of a catalogue, a postal money order and a letter. ”

“ Every concern, except possibly the small establishment doing a strictly neighborhood business, uses the mails more and more in the transaction of its business; we buy, sell, pay bills, collect money, make contracts, and execute all sorts of transactions by mail—all of which necessitates writing letters. Not only is it necessary to answer letters promptly, but the increasing accumulation of correspondence must be preserved and filed in a manner that will permit of easy reference; all of which emphasizes the necessity of systematic methods in the conduct of this very important department. ”