The Postal Service Trump wants to mess up

Carl Newquist

For 34 years, my dad carried mail.  Our family life evolved around the rule "Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds."  

That was not an official motto of the Postal Service, but it was regarded by postal employees as a public trust they were dedicated to keep.  Our family routine was one that began in the very early hours of the morning when Dad got up for work to sort the mail before he went out on his route to deliver it.  From Thanksgiving through New Years, we seldom saw Dad because of the long hours mailmen worked during the Christmas mail rush.

For 12 of his years of service, my dad was president of the local letter carriers association.  At that time, the association did not have the right to collectively bargain.  The letter carriers wished that it did.  With a collective bargaining agreement, there would be written and enforceable standards of performance.  Letter carriers met and served the public every day and knew what it took to deliver the mail on time and to maintain the public confidence in their service.  The people who supervised the post offices did not always share that sense of mission.

Post masters and the people they appointed as supervisors were usually political appointees.  Sometimes a person with long experience and knowledge of the postal business would be appointed to the job, but many were political hacks who had neither the experience nor the interest in the real work of delivering the mail.  They were more interested in cultivating their sense of self-importance.  

At that time, the letter carriers association had to lobby for its hearings on wages, benefits, and working conditions with Congress.  When some policy or management decision threatened the level of service, the carriers would let the powers that be know through their association.  Its power came from the public trust the carriers built and maintained.  The supervisors might screw over their employees, but they cowered before the public's opinion.  Now letter carriers have the right to collectively bargain and have a voice in making the rules under which they operate.

When  I was a very young child, mail deliveries were twice a day, so my dad walked his route two times every day.   Because letter carriers were so familiar with the neighborhoods they served and the people were so familiar with them, they were often consulted when public safety issues came up.  The letter carriers knew where the troubled households were.

Letter carrier at lunch

Now letter carriers operate their routes out vehicles provided by the Post Office.  When my Dad carried, he had to take a bus to his route.  He picked up the mail he sorted from drop boxes along his route and which was deposited there from trucks that serviced the boxes.  His lunch bucket was deposited in a box where my Dad's route would take him around the noon hour.  One would often see letter carriers eating lunch huddled in a drop box.  However, the drop box where my  Dad's lunch was delivered was outside a gas station, and the owner insisted that my Dad come inside and eat his lunch in the office.

Voting by mail has brought Donald Trump's attention to the Postal Service.  He feels that mail-in voting won't work to his advantage, so he has threatened to block funding the Post Office.  As is usual with Trump, he knows or cares little  about what the Postal Service is and who will be affected.  It's another example of the kind of danger he is to the country.  

Those who support him, however, are the real danger.  What can be done about them?