153–54 “If I could, I’d make it a private enterprise and I would create a private corporation to run the postal service and the country would be better off financially,” Kappel later said. “I can’t get from here to there”: Sarah F. Ryan, “Understanding Postal Privatization: Corporations, Unions and ‘The Public Interest’” (thesis, Rutgers University, 1999).
154 Marvin Watson, the new postmaster general, told people that the Kappel Commission’s plan was “going nowhere”: Author interview with Kappel Commission staff member William Sullivan.
155 “Mr. President,” Blount said, “if you want to reform the Post Office, I’d be delighted to do it. If you want a postmaster general like the rest of them, I’m not interested”: Winton M. Blount, Doing It My Way (Lyme, CT: Greenwich Publishing Group, 1996), 96.
156 “That son of a bitch takes away all the job opportunity Republicans have been crying for [for] a generation,” said H. R. Gross, a Republican congressman from Iowa: Ibid., 100.
156 “We called together all of the Republicans in a private off-the-cuff discussion,” says Paul Carlin, Blount’s legislative aide: Interview with author.
157 “Larry, why don’t you stand here to my right?” Nixon said: O’Brien, No Final Victories, 211.
157 “The volume of mail continues to increase,” Blount told a Senate committee: Hearings Before the Committee on Post Office and Civil Service, United States Senate, 1969.
157 “If we don’t pass postal reform and get Blount out of town, he’s going to kill us with those grits,” complained one of Blount’s guests: Blount, Doing It My Way, 102.
157 “He wouldn’t budge on anything,” Kappel later said: David Whitman, “Selling the Reorganization of the Postal Service,” Kennedy School of Government, 1984.
158 Rademacher had attacked Blount’s public relations campaign, calling it “one of the smoothest and most massive attempts at public brainwashing since the German glory days of Joseph Paul Goebbels”: “Hearings Before the Committee on Post Office and Civil Service, United States Senate, Ninety-First Congress” (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1969), 800.
Chapter 8
159 “We’re expecting our first child. . . . Could you possibly take a day or two off so I could get some money?”: Author interview with James Rademacher.
160 “That’s how much they care about you if you treat them right,” he says. “Not every carrier treats them right, of course, but the majority do”: Ibid.
161 Years later, one of the union’s press officers would describe Rademacher as “a modern-day Moses”: Joseph Young, “Postal Union Boss Called a ‘Modern-Day Moses,’” Washington Star, April 5, 1971.
162 “It has been suggested by the city carriers that we cast our lot with them,” said one of their leaders: Lester F. Miller, The National Rural Letter Carriers Association: A Centennial Portrait (Cherbo, 2003).
164 “Congress suffers from a strange occupational ailment,” the magazine wrote: M. Brady Mikusko and F. John Miller, Carriers in a Common Cause: A History of Letter Carriers and the NALC (Washington, DC: Research and Education Dept., National Association of Letter Carriers, 2014), 51.
165 “Fifty million tired taxpayers have been hit in the mailbox with this ruling,” protested Senator Alexander Wiley: Laurence Burd, “Order for Mail Slash Called Pressure Move,” Chicago Daily Tribune, April 20, 1950.
165 “When we are angry (and we have had many occasions to be angry in recent years), we say so in no uncertain terms”: William C. Doherty, Mailman, U.S.A. (New York: David McKay Company, 1960), 209.
165 “I suppose [segregation] has been debated endlessly in all democratic forms of government since long before the War Between the States or the Civil War,” he said. “It is just one of those things”: Philip F. Rubio, There’s Always Work at the Post Office: African American Postal Workers and the Fight for Jobs, Justice, and Equality (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2010).
166 “Dear Mr. Baker, this is where I got the information to call him a sadist. I quoted Funk & Wagnall’s. Yours very truly”: James Rademacher, Oral History, Walther P. Reuther Library of Labor and Urban Affairs, Wayne State University.
166 “They just hated me,” Rademacher laughs: Ibid.
167 “That’s it,” he said. “You don’t want a union? Go . . . now . . . get out!”: Ibid.
168 “Why then, there will be little old AT&T ready and willing, oh so willing, to pick up the pieces and inherit the entire communications complex of the United States of America”: Evening Star, July 25, 1969.
168 “The time has come,” Rademacher predicted, “when responsible union leaders can no longer control the troops”: “Postal Crisis Warning Given,” Washington Daily News, June 10, 1969.
168 The top salary of a letter carrier was $6,000—or the equivalent in today’s dollars of $38,000 a year: Mikusko and Miller, Carriers in a Common Cause, 66.
169 So he sent carriers out after work in 400 cities to retrace their routes and deliver stamped postcards with the message: “SOS: Save our Service! Notify President Nixon right now to sign a pay bill”: Author interview with Rademacher.
169 “We got your message,” Colson said. “We’d like to discuss this with you. When can you come over?”: Rademacher, Oral History.
170 “Cool it,” he told them. “We’re making progress”: Ibid.
170 New York’s Branch No. 36, the NALC’s biggest branch, which represented 7,200 letter carriers in Manhattan and the Bronx: Mikusko and Miller, Carriers in a Common Cause, 68.
171 It was 1,555 in favor of a strike and 1,055 opposed: “The Day the Mail Stopped,” Newsweek, March 30, 1970.
171 “Well, we voted,” he declared, banging his gavel. “That’s it. This is a democratic union”: Vincent Sombrotto, Oral History, Walther P. Reuther Library of Labor and Urban Affairs, Wayne State University.
171 “Your brothers and sisters across the river in Brooklyn are with you 100 percent,” Leventhal said. “We’re shoulder to shoulder”: Ibid.
172 “This is a letter carriers’ strike,” one yelled. “What I want to know is whether the clerks are going to cross our picket line”: Ibid.
172 “But I’m sure as good union members, they will respect any picket line”: John Walsh and Garth Mangum, Labor Struggle in the Post Office: From Selective Lobbying to Collective Bargaining (Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 1992), 21.
172 “What am I going to do?” Johnson asked: Author interview with James Rademacher.
172 “The Post Office will use every means in its command to punish, fine, and imprison leaders of the walkout,” Blount warned: Ibid.
173 “Our members are so militant, so upset they will stay out ’til hell freezes over,” said Henry S. Zych, president of the Chicago NALC branch: “Mail Strike Here!” Chicago Tribune, March 21, 1970.
173 “President Nixon comes face to face today with his most pressing domestic crisis in a showdown forced not by students, restless blacks, or the new left, but by the most solid and dependable corner of middle America—the mailman”: “The Politics of a Strike: Crisis Tied to Maneuvering over Postal Reform,” Washington Post, March 22, 1970.
173 “We’d like to meet with you as soon as possible to try to settle whatever the problem is,” Shultz said: Author interview with Rademacher.
174 Some of its members waved signs that said, “Dump the Rat” and “Impeach Rat-emacher”: “The Day the Mail Stopped.”
174 “That’s the greatest compliment they ever paid me”: Sombrotto, Oral History.
174 “We’re from the SDS”: Strikers Reject Young Radicals’ Aid,” New York Times, March 24, 1970.
175 “I’m with you guys,” another SDS member assured them. “You know, if we weren’t spending all that money in Vietnam we could all get good salaries”: Ibid.
176 “A modern economy is sustained by an endless flow of care
fully directed paper,” Newsweek observed: “The Day the Mail Stopped.”
176 “It was all I could lug,” Purcell said: “How a Brokerage Firm Manages to Operate During Postal Tie-Up: Salesman Becomes a Courier; Brink’s, Bank Wires Help; Some Dividends Are Delayed,” Wall Street Journal, March 24, 1970.
176 The Post Office told businessmen they could also entrust letters to the porters on Amtrak trains: “Air of Confusion Reigns at Post Office Center,” New York Times, March 21, 1970.
177 “You can’t do that!” the man shouted: “The Day the Mail Stopped.”
177 “Yes, but this is different,” the man said: Ibid.
177 “Get back to work,” he commanded: Ibid.
177 “Essential services must be maintained,” Nixon said: “Emergency Cited: President Says Issue Is Survival of Rule, Based Upon Law,” New York Times, March 24, 1970.
178 “I’m a little embarrassed,” admitted Arthur Solomon: “Stamp Business Here Hurt, Too,” New York Times, March 25, 1970.
178 “We know that people are hired temporarily at Christmas time”: “The General and His Brief Campaign,” New York Times, March 26, 1970.
178 “We would exchange verses from Don Quixote and Rime of the Ancient Mariner and other classics”: Author interview with William Burrus.
178 “I never expected to be doing this,” he said: “New York Mountain of Mail Attacked by 600 Servicemen,” New York Times, March 24, 1970.
179 “This is a letter carriers’ strike,” he said. “I’m not getting off TV”: Rademacher, Oral History.
180 “We got eight percent in addition to six percent”: Author interview with Rademacher.
180 “We are going to have chaos and it’s going to be widespread in the postal system if we don’t change the system,” he warned: “Blount Sees Walkout if Postal Reform Lags,” Washington Post, April 28, 1970.
180 “One of the first things that this administration, that is only two years old, wants to do is get out of the stranglehold that Congress has on us”: “Rademacher Urges Postal Reform Move,” Midland Daily News, May 23, 1970.
181 “I think what distinguishes the present Postmaster General is that he is probably the first who holds this office who instead of fighting to stay in the President’s Cabinet has fought to get out,” Nixon said: Richard Nixon, “Remarks on Signing the Postal Reorganization Act,” August 12, 1970, http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=2623.
Chapter 9
183 In 1971, its managers presided over an organization with 728,911 employees and a $9 billion annual budget: Annual Report of the Postmaster General, July 1, 1970–June 30, 1971, United States Postal Service.
183 In 1971 it delivered 50 billion letters, which accounted for 57 percent of its total volume: Ibid.
183 These machines weren’t as fast as the optical character readers, but they could process 36,000 letters an hour: Edward Edelson, “How Science Will Speed Your Mail,” Popular Science, March 1971.
184 “These days, it seems, just about everybody has some personal horror story to tell about the U.S. Postal Service”: Irwin Ross, “What the Postal Service Can’t Deliver,” Fortune, 1973.
185 Between 1971 and 1975, the postal service signed three collective bargaining agreements that raised the experienced postal worker’s annual salary: “Postal Pact Seen Costing $1 Billion Annual by 1978,” Wall Street Journal, July 22, 1975.
185 “I don’t consider it generous,” Filbey said. “It is the best the Postal Service could do under the present circumstance”: Ibid.
185–86 “I thought it was a mistake when they made the change and put it into a separate agency way out of the cabinet,” Farley said: WCBS interview, May 29, 1975, U.S. Postal Service Library.
186 “It is clear now that turning the United States Post Office into an autonomous public corporation in 1971 has failed to realize the hopes of its proponents”: “Delivering the Bad News,” New York Times, April 21, 1977.
186 “Consider a corporation whose volume is stagnating”: “Managing the Mail,” Washington Post, April 25, 1977.
186 Hillblom mocked their sit-ins, saying they would never achieve anything unless they adopted Mao Tse-tung’s: James D. Scurlock, King Larry: The Life and Ruins of a Billionaire Genius (New York: Scribner, 2012), 10.
187 All they had between them was $500 in cash and a credit card: Mary A. Fischer, “Where’s Poppa?” GQ, August 1998.
188 Hillblom flew to Hong Kong and hired Henry Litton: Scurlock, King Larry, 52.
188 The press agent invited Hong Kong’s postmaster to debate Henry Litton at a posh downtown hotel: Ibid.
188 “They were thugs,” says James Campbell, a former DHL attorney. “They were selling protection”: Author interview with Campbell.
189 The U.S. Postal Service had issued new regulations in 1974, defining a letter broadly as “a message directed to a specific person or address and recorded in or on a tangible object”: James I. Campbell Jr., The Rise of Global Delivery Services (Washington, DC: J. Campbell Press, 2001), 20.
189 Smith’s father suffered a heart attack in 1948, when Fred was four years old: Vance H. Trimble, Overnight Success: Federal Express and Frederick Smith, Its Renegade Creator (New York: Crown, 1993), 58–62.
189 As a boy, Smith suffered from Perthes’ disease: Jennifer L. O’Shea, “10 Things You Didn’t Know About Fred Smith,” U.S. New and World Report, July 24, 2008.
190 Smith ultimately got around that by purchasing small, French-built Falcons: Roger Frock, Changing How the World Does Business: FedEx’s Incredible Journey to Success—The Inside Story (San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler, 2006), 32.
191 “They needed service primarily in the northeast where they were having some problems getting mail moved rapidly on an overnight basis,” says Roger Frock, a former Federal Express senior vice president: Author interview with Frock.
191 He was crushed when the planes arrived around midnight with only six items, including a birthday present Smith had purchased for an employee and a bag of dirty laundry: Trimble, Overnight Success, 152.
191 “You mean you took our last $5,000?” Roger Frock said. “How could you do that?”: Frock, Changing How the World Does Business, 101.
191 But shortly after, he told his board that he was about to be indicted: Trimble, Overnight Success, 185.
192 Ten days later while he was behind the wheel of his 1972 blue Ford LTD, Smith struck and killed a 53-year-old handyman who was leaving a Memphis bar around midnight: Ibid., 186.
192 “There’s just too much pressure, and I can’t take it anymore,” Smith said: Ibid., 191.
192 “I could really go for a beer right now,” he said: Frock, Changing How the World Does Business, 149.
192 The district attorney in Memphis dropped the criminal charge against him: Trimble, Overnight Success, 206.
192 A Little Rock jury acquitted him of the forgery charges after Smith testified unabashedly that he had falsified the documents to save his company from going under: Ibid., 207.
193 “You don’t know anything about this act,” Smith snapped at him: Frock, Changing How the World Does Business.
193 “Two tours in Vietnam and a six-year struggle to turn a college paper and a flock of purple airplanes into an airline have streaked Fred Smith’s hair with gray at the age of 34,” the Associated Press wrote: “His Air Freight Line Success Beats Odds,” Chicago Tribune, October 1, 1978.
194 “He was just charismatic,” says John Zorack, a lobbyist: Author interview with Zorack.
194 “Everybody saw Bolger as the guy who can fix things,” says Michael Coughlin: Author interview with Coughlin.
195 “I’ll resist, with every fiber of my being, any legislation to make it easier for private delivery systems to operate,” he vowed: “U.S. Postal Service: A Monopoly Trying to Beat the Competition,” Nation’s Business, May 1979.
&nbs
p; 195 “There are some interests, including many good USPS customers, charging that the postal service is expanding its monopoly,” Wilson said: “Private Express Statutes Hearings Before the Subcommittee on Postal Operations and Services of the Committee on Post Office and Civil Service,” U.S House of Representatives, 1978, 20.
197 “At a time when we are battling inflation and trying to keep insurance affordable, it is absurd for the Postal Service to attempt to extend the monopoly to items that are not, in any ordinary popular sense, letters,” said Philip Shaughnessy: Ibid., 74.
197 “Let me stop you here,” he said. “You say you operate in Hong Kong and Singapore?”: Ibid., 201.
198 “I had to laugh. We had a reception. Larry never wore anything but blue jeans and T-shirts”: Author interview with Zorack.
198 the USPS charged an extra $5.60 for pickup: “For Post Office Overnight Mail Service Is Absolutely Positively Not So Easy,” Wall Street Journal, June 12, 1985.
199 “When the kids in our marketing department talked to customers about the postal service, in general, they said, ‘The sleepy old Post Office’”: Author interview with Frock.
199 “We’re just taking a commonly accepted attitude, such as the perception of postal workers, and having fun with it,” Francis X. McGuire, a Federal Express spokesman, said: Ernest Holsendolph, “A Postal Service Retort,” New York Times, May 12, 1982.
199 “Our strategy was, ‘Let it die. Let it go,’” says John Nolan, a former deputy postmaster general: Author interview with Nolan.
200 “Private enterprise will get the mail delivered just as it did in the Old West,” he argued: “Reagan Official Urges End to Postal Service,” Associated Press, August 28, 1985.
Chapter 10
202 He had purchased several boxes of doughnuts for his coworkers on his way to work: Michael H. Bigler, “Former Postman Remembers ‘Fateful Day,’” Edmond Sun, April 19, 1987.
202 “I’m going to get even, and everybody’s going to know”: Report of the United States Postal Service Commission on a Safe and Secure Workplace (New York: National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University, August 2000), 153.
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