The Postal Worker’s Christmas; The New York Times, December 18, 2018

Sarah Anderson,The New York Times; The Postal Worker’s Christmas

[Kip Currier: At this busy time for sending and receiving holiday cards and gifts, it's important to underscore the vital connection that U.S. Post Offices have in promoting democratic principles and access to information. Indeed, just last week while stopping in a rural Western Pennsylvania post office, I saw and heard first-hand from residents the important roles that U.S. postal offices play in the everyday lives of citizens, many of whom do not live near for-profit delivery companies.

An August 2018 piece, "The miracle of the United States Postal Service", written by a man who grew up in a Utah town with 171 inhabitants, explains:

Postal service has been absolutely central to the history and development of the United States, and the USPS continues to provide fast and efficient service despite being beset by enormous problems. If everything worked as well as the Post Office — and there's certainly room for improvement — this country would be a much better place...

Under the arguments of Washington and his ally Benjamin Rush, Congress conceived of a Post Office conforming to democratic values. Unlike European postal services, which were generally expensive provinces of the elite (plus state surveillance and espionage), the U.S. Post Office would ideally be available to just about anybody who needed it. Tampering of any kind, state or private, was outlawed.

Yes, much communication today does transpire through digital means, chief among them, smart phones. But many still use and depend upon analog services to send and receive a wide array of products and services (see the Op-Ed piece in today's New York Times), as well as for communication and information access. We still talk about Digital Divides--one of the most significant being lack of access to Broadband Internet service for many Americans; especially, in disproportionate numbers, Native Americans, as this disturbing February 2018 Politico exposé ("The least connected people in America") reported. Yet it's also crucial that we be cognizant of an Analog Divide that could occur if postal services are eliminated or drastically curtailed in rural communities. Amidst calls by some for privatizing the U.S. Postal Service, policymakers and legislators must fully consider this information-democratizing service as one of the innumerable interconnected building blocks upon which democracy stands and flourishes.

And if you should need more convincing, the next time you're in Washington D.C., do visit the National Postal Museum. Not as well-known as its more famous, "sexier" relatives (--I'm looking at you National Air and Space Museum!) in the famed Smithsonian Museums system (all of which are free!), I was thoroughly impressed by a visit to this gem of a cultural heritage institution a few years ago. Through a variety of exhibits and artifacts, visitors like me come to better understand the visible and less visible ways that the postal service promotes core democratic principles and supports the infrastructure of democracy. 

Despite the fact that it's not an official motto, the U.S. Postal Service is often associated with this quotation from an ancient work by Greek historian Herodotus: "Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds." 

  

Though certainly inspiring and memorable, a different quotation more aptly encapsulates some of the fundamental roles that the U.S. Postal Service performs in a democracy like ours. As the U.S. Postal Service shares:

Another, less well known inscription can be found on the building that formerly was the Washington, D.C., Post Office and now is the home of the Smithsonian Institution's National Postal Museum. It is located on Massachusetts Avenue and North Capitol Street, N.E.

  

Messenger of Sympathy and Love 
Servant of Parted Friends 
Consoler of the Lonely
Bond of the Scattered Family
Enlarger of the Common Life 
Carrier of News and Knowledge 
Instrument of Trade and Industry 
Promoter of Mutual Acquaintance
Of Peace and of Goodwill Among Men and Nations]

"As in my grandfather’s day, today’s postal workers have a mandate to provide universal service, delivering mail and packages to every American household at uniform rates, no matter where they live. That mandate has helped bind our vast nation.

This principle of affordable universal service is under threat. This year, the White House Office of Management and Budget recommended selling the public Postal Service to a private, for-profit corporation.

On Dec. 4, a Trump task force on the postal system followed up with recommendations for partial privatization and other changes that would reduce services and raise delivery prices, particularly for rural communities."