Help save our mail delivery!

Yesterday, the U.S. Postmaster General John E. Potter addressed a subcommittee of the U.S. Senate and asked to change the rules that require that the mail be delivered six days a week here, in order to save money. For details, click here.

I'm hoping that doesn't happen. The U.S. postal service has been a part of our country from the very beginning. In fact, Benjamin Franklin was appointed as the first Postmaster General by the Continental Congress in 1775. I think we need to hang on to this part of our country and to the "daily delivery" tradition.

According to "The United States Postal Service: An American History, 1775-2006," a booklet you can view or download at www.usps.gov (or www.usps.com), "Originally, letter carriers worked 52 weeks a year, typically 9 to 11 hours a day from Monday through Saturday, and if necessary, part of Sunday." Additionally, many homes received mail twice a day, and businesses had mail delivered up to four times a day.

So, six-day-a-week mail delivery has a long history in our country.

If you'd like to see U.S. Mail continue to be delivered six days a week, I think the first step is to contact the senators on the Subcommittee on Federal Financial Management, Government Information, Federal Services, and International Security. That's who the postmaster general talked to yesterday. Those subcommittee members are Thomas R. Carper (chairman, D-Del), John McCain (R-Ariz), Carl Levin (D-Mich), Tom Coburn (R-Okla), Daniel K. Akaka (D-Hawaii), George V. Voinovich (R-Ohio) and Jon Tester (D-Mont).

The subcommittee is part of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security & Governmental Affairs. Other members of that committee are Joseph Lieberman (chairman, Conn), Susan M. Collins (Maine), Mark L. Pryor (Ark), John Ensign (Nev), Mary Landrieu (La), Lindsey Graham (S.C.), Claire McCaskill (Mo), Roland Burris (Ill.) and Michael Bennett (Colo).

According to the committee's Web page, you can contact the members by mail at 340 Dirksen Senate Office Building, Washington, D.C. 20510. There also are phone numbers and fax numbers listed on the site. And, you can find links to all of the senators at the Senate Web site. It might be a good idea to also contact your senator and let him/her know how you feel about the situation.

You might also want to contact the postmaster general John "Jack" Potter at 475 L’Enfant Plaza SW, Washington DC 20260-0010. Or, you can send an e-mail to the USPS via this link.

Of course, one of the best ways to support the U.S. Postal Service is to write letters and mail them. Within the United States, it only costs 42 cents to mail a letter that weighs 1 ounce or less. That's several sheets of paper and an envelope. Forty-two cents. You can mail a letter from anywhere in the U.S. to anywhere else in the U.S. for less than the cost of a candy bar, less than a cup of coffee, less than almost anything. And, if you'd rather send a short note on a postcard, that costs just 27 cents! You can even send a 1-ounce or lighter letter anywhere in the world, from the U.S., for less than $1!

So, it's a good deal. And, we may lose part of the convenience of the deal if we no longer have daily (except for Sunday) delivery and pick-up of mail.

Let's do what we can to save our postal service!