Postal Service and the Public : a Case Study in Public Policy

University of Massachusetts Amherst ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst Doctoral Dissertations 1896 - February 2014 1-1-1983 Postal service and the public : a case study in public policy. M. Elliot Vittes University of Massachusetts Amherst Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.umass.edu/dissertations_1 Recommended Citation Vittes, M. Elliot, "Postal service and the public : a case study in public policy." (1983). Doctoral Dissertations 1896 - February 2014. 1903. https://scholarworks.umass.edu/dissertations_1/1903 This Open Access Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst. It has been accepted for inclusion in Doctoral Dissertations 1896 - February 2014 by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks@UMass Amherst. For more information, please contact [email protected]. POSTAL SERVICE AND THE PUBLIC: A CASE STUDY IN PUBLIC POLICY A Dissertation Presented By M. ELLIOT VITTES Submitted to the Graduate School of the University of Massachusetts in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY September 1983 Political Science Department M. Elliot Vittes 1983 c All Rights Reserved ii POSTAL SERVICE AND THE PUBLIC: A CASE STUDY IN PUBLIC POLICY A Dissertation Presented By M. ELLIOT VITTES Approved as to style and content by: Sedgwick ,A€nairman of Committee Jerqme M. Mileur, Member (jerald McFarland, Member [tc^ /\U-j J^O-^ .en Gordon, Department Chairperson Political Science Department iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I want to first of all thank my committee for their assistance and guidance throughout the project. Their patience and constructive cri- ticism have been essential to the fulfillment of this study. I have enjoyed working with Jeffrey Sedgwick, Jerome Mileur, and Gerald McFar- land. The help of fellow students has also been crucial to this endeavor Bill Grover, Dan Russell, and Tammy Thomas have been supportive and helpful during the whole project. Many people in the Department of Political Science at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst have con- tributed to my success and to this work while I have been here. Their role, whether students, faculty, or staff, has been significant in vari ous ways, and I appreciate every one of them. Glen Gordon has been as supportive and decent a Chairman of a department as can be, and I appreciate all he has done to help graduate students. The atmosphere created in the program has been conducive to helping make the doctoral experience a positive one. Finally, I thank Sally Ives for her typing of the manuscript. iv ABSTRACT Postal Service and the Public: A Case Study in Public Policy (September, 1983) M. Elliot Vittes, B.A., William Paterson College M.A., Cornell University, Ph.D., University of Massachusetts Directed by: Professor Jeffrey L. Sedgwick This is a study of postal service development in the United States from the 1770s to the present. It presents a comparative perspective on the change of the Post Office from a government department to a public corporation and what this transformation tells us about the American political system's approach to public service provision. The history of the Post Office indicates three major tensions in the approach to postal service. There have been shifts of emphasis within these areas, so that new accommodations in the tensions have re- placed older ones. The first tension is between a national Post Office Department which was closely tied to local communities through Congress and the nature of administration and an increasingly nationally-oriented postal corpora- the tion. The public corporate form frees the Post Office from many of constraints of and inputs from local conditions. The second tension is between a politically responsive part of Executive and government with oversight and direct involvement by the organization Congress as opposed to an autonomous corporate form of V which is purposefully insulated from the operations of those two branches of government. The change to a Post Office which is indepen- dent from Congressional and Executive politics is intended to allow for concentration on a businesslike approach to postal service rather than a more political approach. The third tension is between service demands on the Post Office from interest groups and individuals and the goal of economic efficiency Intended to reduce or ameliorate deficits. Service demands tended to shape financial conditions for much of Post Office history, while re- cently the economic stance has become a more decisive factor in service strategies chosen by the United States Postal Service. All three represent continuing accommodations within the American political culture. The Post Office has always been a national institu- tion, but the types of ties to localities have changed so that it is presently removed from significant input from communities. Its role in helping to promote commerce has always been important, but recent re- forms have moved the Post Office closer to a business form, which change its abilities or stance as a public service. Finally, there have always been financial constraints on the Post Office, but whereas earlier the extension of service was politically attractive and economically feasi- made ble, the economics of postal service and Post Office deficits have finances a significant focus of postal decisionmaking. The development of postal service in the United States reflects deals with pub- changes in the political system and the way in which it vi lie service demands. The use of the government corporation form sub- jects the Post Office to different pressures and influences than use of the government department form, and so defines public service in a changed manner. The Postal Service has become more attentive to demands consistent with a corporate form, while it has become less responsive to more traditional types of political pressure placed on government departments. This has altered the orientation and nature of service, and the place of the Post Office within the context of a governmental agency. vii TABLE OF CONTENTS ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS iv Chapter I. INTRODUCTION 1 The Place of Public Corporations in the Modern State . 2 Importance of Inquiry into the Public Corporation ... 5 Traditional Approaches to the Study of Public Corpora- tions 7 Postal Service as a Topic of Study 10 Economic efficiency 11 Productivity increases 13 Managerial and administrative efficiency 13 The Approach of This Study 16 Notes 21 II. POSTAL SERVICE IN THE NEW NATION 24 A Continental Post Office 25 The Post Office of the Continental Congress 28 The Post Office under the Articles 29 A Constitutional Post Office 35 The Postal Acts of 1792 and 1794 39 Congress and Policy 46 Conclusion 48 Service provision 48 A national system 52 Facilitator of commercial development 56 Notes 61 III. THE POSTAL TELEGRAPH 70 Notes 94 IV. RURAL FREE DELIVERY 101 Notes 126 V. THE NEW ERA POSTAL SERVICE: CONTEMPORARY TIMES 132 Recent History of the Post Office 132 The Hoover Commission The Kappel Commission x-" The Postal Reorganization Act of 1970 1'^'^ Evaluation of the United States Postal Service 1^6 viii Managerial restructuring and autonomy, and institu- tional decentralization and flexibility 149 Economic and administrative efficiency 152 Personnel policy 157 Rate structuring and rate setting procedures 163 Research and development 174 Conclusions 184 Notes 19 3 VI. CONCLUSIONS 201 Notes 217 BIBLIOGRAPHY 219 ix CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION This chapter introduces the topic of postal service and its changed character in the context of American politics. The Post Office began as an integral operating part of the national government but has been trans- formed into a public corporation which is tied to the national government but removed from direct and ongoing Congressional or Executive control. This change to a public corporation occurred in 1971. The discussion of the Post Office sets out the differences between a postal service operated as a government department or agency and one run as a public corporation. The new form taken is the result of altered conditions in the society and political process and reflects one contemporary approach to the provision of public services. Therefore, the recent growth in the use of public corporations makes the topic one of interest and importance in contemporary affairs, for it is indicative of how the political system is attempting to cope with the demands of modern American life. The reasons for the use of the corporate form in the provision of postal service can be better understood through defin- ing the term "public corporations," positing the importance of the in- both quiry, and explaining the approach taken in discussing the subject, traditionally and in this study. 1 2 2 The Place of Public Corporations in the Modern State Public corporations are extra-governmental entities, tied to the state by authorizing legislation, legitimacy, implicit and/or explicit financial guarantees, and "ownership." They are part of the government in the sense of having been created by government and retaining certain ties to government, but they operate autonomously from the regular departments (and constraints) of government. They are free from regular budgetary processes, public administrative techniques, political battles involving the executive departments, political patronage, and some or all civil service requirements. Instead, they are established to operate on the managerial model of private business in order to take advan- tage of the flexibility, aggressiveness, and efficiency"^ which the ab- sence of government constraints is said to allow. They are intended to be financially self-sufficient, or at least economically efficient given their mandate, and able to pursue their goals in a "businesslike" way. The growth in the use of the public corporate form has been tied to reactions to emergencies which occurred because of foreign policy con- siderations (World Wars and the Cold War), economic distress (the Great Depression), and the social welfare programs meant to meet these crises Office, how- (the New Deal, the Great Society).

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