Margaret Anderson, shot to death while working as a park ranger at Mount Rainier National Park. If approved by the Senate, the post office in Eatonsville, Washington will be named after her. (photo: National Park Service)
The last session of Congress was noted (and criticized) for its lack productivity. But lawmakers in recent years have been active when it comes to the urgent matter of naming post offices after fallen heroes.
Over the last 10 years of congressional sessions, more than 15% of all bills passed and signed into law dedicated a postal branch after someone.
Congress hasn’t always been so obsessed with naming post offices. But after September 11, senators and representatives began memorializing some victims of the attacks by attaching their names to U.S. Post Service (USPS) operations. Then, the practice continued by naming branches after fallen soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan.
During all of this time focused on memorials, Congress did little to shore up the USPS’ financial future, making it uncertain just how long the dedications will last.
“If Congress expected that the naming a Post Office would provide a long-lasting memorial, the financial problems of the Postal Service risks making the memorial an ephemeral one at best,” Alan Robinson wrote for the Courier Express and Postal Observer. “It is too bad that Congress does not understand the irony in its rush to name Post Offices to honor heroes when it has not taken steps to ensure the survival of the institution whose facilities are used to provide the memorial.”
-Noel Brinkerhoff
To Learn More:
In Past Decade, Congress Has Made Naming Post Offices a Top Priority (by Alan Robinson, Courier Express and Postal Observer)
Current Congress Has Passed Fewer Bills than any Since at Least the 1940s (by Matt Bewig, AllGov)
Congress Struggles to Deliver Solution to Postal Problem It Created (by Matt Bewig, AllGov)
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