In response to the U.S. Post Office's plans to end Saturday mail service, historian
Richard R. John (Columbia University) has written an
op-ed in the
New York Times. John is the author of
Spreading the News: The American Postal System from Franklin to Morse (Harvard University Press, 1995). Here's a taste of the op-ed:
In 1899, Postmaster General Charles Emory Smith called the post office
the “greatest business concern in the world.” He had it wrong. The post
office is a public service with a civic mandate central to American
business, society and civic culture — not a business. But if it is to
survive, Congress must allow it to start acting like one.
The rest is
here.
