On this day in Labor History the year was 1775.
That was the day that the United States Post Office was created in Philadelphia under Benjamin Franklin.
Franklin was a member of the Second Continental Congress.
Among many distinctions Ben Franklin was the nation’s first Postmaster General.
Franklin received a salary of $1,000, with an additional $340 for a secretary and comptroller.
His responsibility spanned all Post Offices from Massachusetts to Georgia and he had the authority to hire additional postmasters as necessary.
Previously, in 1753, Benjamin Franklin helped lead the postal service in the colonies.
He made numerous improvements to the mail system, including setting up new, more efficient routes.
He had also been able to cut delivery time in half between Philadelphia and New York by having the weekly mail wagon travel both day and night via relay teams.
In 1774, the British fired Franklin from his postmaster job because of his revolutionary activities.
There have been postal unions dating back to the nineteenth century.
Those early unions had essentially no bargaining rights.
They existed largely as lobbying organizations that otherwise would have had no say about their working conditions.
Wage increases depended on the whim of Congress.
On March 18, 1970, thousands of New York City postal workers walked off the job in protest.
They were joined in the streets by 200,000 others in 30 major cities.
Mail service ground to a halt and the plight of postal workers was brought to the public's attention.
The strike was soon settled, with Congress approving a 6 percent wage increase.
The strike served as an impetus for the enactment of the Postal Reorganization Act of 1970, which granted unions the right to negotiate with management over their wages, benefits and working conditions.
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Labor History in 2:00 brought to you by the Illinois Labor History Society and The Rick Smith Show