No feature of this question has been more persistently misrepresented
than the relative value to the railroads of the mail business and the
express business.
As elsewhere shown, the express business is 52 per cent more valuable
to the Burlington road than the Government mails on the mere basis of
space used and facilities furnished in passenger trains. There are
many other considerations which increase this disparity of value in
favor of the express, but reference to them is omitted in order to
direct public attention to the following statements of the
Postmaster-General in his recent letter upon the subject:
(_Congressional Record_, March 4, 1910, 61st Congress, Second Session,
Vol. 45, No. 60, Page 2802.)
LETTER OF THE POSTMASTER-GENERAL RELATIVE TO THE SERVICE
RENDERED BY THE RAILROAD COMPANIES IN CONNECTION WITH THE MAILS
AND WITH EXPRESS.
"OFFICE OF THE POSTMASTER-GENERAL,
"WASHINGTON, D.C., January 31, 1910.
"Hon. JOHN W. WEEKS,
_Chairman Committee on Post Offices and
Post Roads, House of Representatives_.
"MY DEAR SIR: In response to your inquiry as to the difference
between the service rendered the Post Office Department by
railroad companies in the carriage and handling of the mails, and
that rendered express companies, I would state that from such
information as we have been able to obtain in regard to the
service rendered to express companies, the difference is
substantially as follows:
"The Post Office Department requires the railroad company to
take the mail from the post office wherever the office is within
80 rods of the depot, and the company has an agent, and in many
cases to perform the terminal service regardless of the distance
between the post office and the station. Wherever the terminal
service is taken up by the Department, by means of regulation or
screen-wagon service, the contractor delivers the mail at a
specified place at the depot, and from that point the railroad
employees transport it to the cars, and if the amount is so
great that it would impose a hardship upon the postal employees
to load and store this mail, the railroad company is called upon
to furnish porters to do the work. Where the mail messenger or
contractor can drive direct to the cars, he does so. The express
companies haul all of their matter to the railroad stations and
put it in the cars, using their own employees and their own
trucks.
"The cars furnished the Post Office Department and those
furnished the express companies differ very materially. The
former are built according to specifications furnished by the
Department, and are fully equipped with letter cases, paper
racks, drawers, and lockers for registered mail and supplies,
and all of the equipment necessary for the distribution of mail
en route. The cars furnished the express companies have very
little, if any, interior furnishings, and are more like the cars
used for the transportation of baggage. In both cases the cars
used are owned by the railroad company.
"The number of employees transported for the Post Office
Department is very much greater than for the express companies.
There are frequently five or six clerks in the postal cars, and
on fast mail trains, where there are two or three working cars
to a train, the number runs up as high as 23. The express seldom
requires more than two men in a car.
"The Post Office Department claims as much space at depots
without specific payment therefor as may be required for the
storing and handling of mail in transit. The express companies
are required to pay the railroad companies for all space used at
depots.
"On smaller lines a separate apartment must be furnished for the
mails other than baggage mails. The express matter is usually
placed in the baggage car.
"Upon arrival at terminals the railroad company may be required
to unload a mail car, if the quantity is such as to impose a
hardship upon the clerks, and to see that it is loaded into the
contractor's wagons; or, if the terminal service devolves upon
the railroad company, that it is delivered into the post office.
The express company unloads and handles its own matter.
"The railroad and express companies frequently use a joint
employee to handle baggage and express, thereby economizing in
cost of help. That can very seldom be done in connection with
the postal service.
"The railroad company has charge of all baggage mails in transit
and receives them into and delivers them from the cars. It also
handles other mails when necessary to transfer them between cars
or trains. 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. They are required to make monthly affidavits as to
performance of service. It is understood that the company never
assumes control of express matter. The Department is not
informed as to the terms of contracts between railroad and
express companies, and therefore can not state what
responsibility is imposed as to transportation.
"Mail cranes for the exchange of mail at points where trains do
not stop are erected and kept in repair by and at the expense of
the railroad company, whose employees must hang the mail bag on
the crane and adjust it for catching at points where the
company provides side service. The mail catchers are also
furnished by them. No service of this character is rendered
express companies.
"A railroad company is required by law to carry the mails upon
any train that may be run, when so ordered by the
Postmaster-General, without extra charge therefor, and as a
result the mails are carried on the fastest trains and with
great frequency. Express matter is not as a rule carried on the
fast limited passenger trains, nor with the frequency with which
mails are carried.
"In this connection your attention is invited to pages 84 to 94,
516, 517, 860 to 863, part 1, and pages 687 to 696, part 2, of
the testimony before the Congressional Commission which
investigated the postal service in 1900--Wolcott-Loud
Commission.
"Yours very truly,
"F. H. HITCHCOCK,
"_Postmaster-General_."
The Government does not own any railroad, but, under the present
system, the Post Office Department dictates to the railroad companies
upon what passenger trains and in what kind of cars the mails shall be
carried. It insists on such space and facilities as it deems necessary
for the mails being furnished on the fastest and most expensive trains
and demands that these trains keep their fast schedules; this means
that all other trains on the road are side-tracked and delayed
whenever that is necessary in order to expedite the mails.
There are no such features in the express business.
Demanding a preference traffic, the Government ought to be willing to
pay for it more than express rates. In fact, it pays much less than
express rates.
The ablest and most competent witness who appeared before the Wolcott
Commission on this subject was Henry S. Julier, Vice-President and
General Manager of the American Express Company, who said: "Without
question, the Government has the cheaper service by far."
Mr. Julier further stated that seven pounds is the average weight of
packages sent by express, and the seven pound package is the typical
express package, and therefore the earnings from carrying such
packages are the true index of the rates actually received. Some
railroads receive as their compensation fifty per cent of the express
company's earnings; the C. B. & Q. receives fifty-seven and a half per
cent.
Mr. Julier was asked by the Commission to file statements showing from
the rates in force exactly the revenue received per hundred-weight by
the railroad company from the express in comparison with the mail
rates. He filed the following:
_Table Showing Rates Received by Railways Per Hundred-weight for Mails
and Rates Received for Express Between Points Named._
EXPRESS.
50 per cent of
MAIL. express companies'
Rate per 100 earnings on fourteen
pounds allowed 7-pound packages
railroad companies weighing in the
under last aggregate 100
weighing, pounds, yields the
including the pay railroad companies
for post office the rate per 100
Distance. cars. pounds noted below.
New York to
Buffalo 440 $1.58 $2.80
Chicago 980 3.57 4.55
Omaha 1,480 5.38 5.95
Indianapolis 906 3.27 4.55
Columbus 761 2.49 3.85
East St. Louis 1,171 4.38 4.90
Portland, Me. 347 1.33 2.80
Chicago to
Milwaukee 85 .34 2.10
Minneapolis 421 1.83 3.85
New Orleans 922 5.27 5.95
Detroit 284 1.34 2.80
Cincinnati 306 1.20 3.15
Cincinnati to
St. Louis 374 1.61 3.15
Chicago 306 1.20 3.15
Cleveland 263 1.26 2.80
Since the filing of these statistics, the rates paid to
railroads for carrying the mails have been reduced almost a
fifth.
The statements of the Postmaster-General and the statistics
confirm the evidence of these returns that the express business
is much more valuable to railroad companies than the Government
mail business.
W.W. BALDWIN,
_Vice-President_.
JOHN DEWITT,
_General Mail Agent_.