



Produced by MFR, Adrian Mastronardi, The Philatelic Digital
Library Project at http://www.tpdlp.net and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
file was produced from images generously made available
by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.)





Transcriber’s Note: Punctuation and typographical errors have been
corrected without note. A list of the more substantial amendments made to
the text appears at the end.




[Illustration: “The primary step in connection with second-class mail
is taken in the forests of the American continent.”--_Senator J. P.
Dolliver._]




                        Postal Riders and Raiders

        _Are we fools? If we are not fools, why then continue to
         act foolishly, thus inviting railroad, express company
                    and postoffice officials to treat
                        us as if we were fools?_

                        By The Man On The Ladder

                              (W. H. GANTZ)

                 Issued By The Independent Postal League

                            CHICAGO, U. S. A.
                                  1912

                     COPYRIGHT, 1912, BY THE AUTHOR
                           ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

                  Price $1.50, Prepaid to Any Address.
                       Independent Postal League,
                         No. 5037 Indiana Ave.,
                                 Chicago




FOREWORD TO THE READER.


The mud-sills of this book are hewn from the presupposition that the
person who reads it has not only the essentially necessary equipment to
do his own thinking, but also a more or less practiced habit of doing it.
It is upon such foundation the superstructure of this volume was built.
It is written in the hope of promoting, or provoking, thought on certain
subjects, along certain lines--not to create or school thinkers. So, if
the reader lacks the necessary cranial furnishing to do his own thinking,
or, if having that, he has a cultivated habit of letting other people do
his hard thinking and an ingrown desire to let them continue doing so,
such reader may as well stop at this period. In fact, he would better
do so. The man who has his thinking done by proxy is possibly as happy
and comfortable on a siding as he would be anywhere--as he is capable
of being. I have no desire to disturb his state or condition of static
felicity. Besides, such a man might “run wild” or otherwise interfere
with the traffic if switched onto the main line.

Emerson has somewheres said, “Beware when God turns a thinker loose in
the world.” Of course Emerson cautioned about constructive and fighting
thinkers, not thinkers who think they know because somebody told them so,
or who think they have thought till they know all about some unknowable
thing--the ratio of the diameter to the circumference of the circle, how
to construct two hills without a valley between, to build a bunghole
bigger than the barrel, and the like.

There are thinkers and thinkers. Emerson had the distinction between
them clearly in mind no doubt when he wrote that quoted warning. So,
also, has the thinking reader. It is for him this volume is planned;
to him its arguments and statements of fact are intended to appeal.
Its chapters have been hurriedly written--some of them written under
conditions of physical distress. The attempts at humor may be attempts
only; the irony may be misplaced or misapplied; the spade-is-a-spade
style may be blunt, harsh or even coarse to the point of offensiveness.
Still, if its reading provokes or otherwise induces thought, the purpose
of its writing, at least in some degree, will have been attained. It is
not asked that the reader agree with the conclusions of the text. If he
read the facts stated and thinks--_thinks for himself_--he will reach
right conclusions. The facts are of easy comprehension. It requires no
superior academic knowledge nor experience of years to understand them
and their significance--their lesson.

Just read and think. Do not let any “official” noise nor breakfast-food
rhetoric so syncopate and segregate your thought as to derail it from
the main line of facts. Lofty, persuasive eloquence is often but the
attractive drapery of planned falsehood, and the beautifully rounded
period is often but a “steer” for an ulterior motive--a “tout” for a
marked-card game. Do not be a “come-on” for any verbal psychic work
or worker. Just stubbornly persist in doing your own thinking, ever
remembering that in this vale of tears, “Plain hoss sense’ll pull you
through when ther’s nothin’ else’ll do.”

As a thinker, you will now have lots of company, and they are still
coming in droves. Respectable company, too. Mr. Roosevelt suddenly
_arrived_ a few days since at Columbus, Ohio. Then there is Mr. Carnegie
and Judge Gary. The senior Mr. Rockefeller, also, has announced, through
a representative, that he is on the way. These latter, of course, have
been thinkers for many years--thinkers on personal service lines chiefly,
it has been numerously asserted. Now, however, if press accounts are
true,