restrictions on the amount of shipments which had been put into effect in the Dallas, Tex., region of the Post Office.

There was a middle level official of the Federal Reserve Board who attended that meeting and from what is reported to me, after he achieved his principal purpose of seeing that we were going to withdraw the limitations, he also brought up some incidental points about the care of currency shipments during the periods they were in the custody of railroad companies, also the question of locks on contract car route vehicles and the matter of qualifications and bonds of star route employees.

We are instituting a program under which employees of star route contractors will be fingerprinted as an additional precaution to try to avoid situations where people having access to valuable postal shipments during transit may turn out to be people with serious police records.

Mr. BROOKS. General, in your statement you said that you would plan to and are going to continue to review all of the security procedures. I was wondering whether you would give particular attention to having virtually unarmed guards and drivers exposed to possible serious injury by criminals. What is your reaction to letting these people drive these trucks; what do you think about that?

Mr. DAY. Well, I think the fact that there has not been a postal employee killed or injured in the operation of a mail transportation situation since 1926 is a very pertinent factor; and, as I mentioned, the 1926 robbery did involve the escort of a postal vehicle by city police.

I think that it is again speculative as to the amount of protection. you can have that will absolutely guarantee that you can't have a robbery in a given situation, because in this 1926 case, as an example, there were three guards with machineguns inside of the armored car but they got away with over $400,000.

RECORD GOOD ON MAIL SHIPMENT OF CURRENCY

Mr. BROOKS. General, has the Post Office record, then, over the years, been good relative to the shipment of currency through the mails?

Mr. DAY. It has been unbelievably good because there have been during the last 32 years only 18 robberies of mail in transit and the gross loss, even aside from the recoveries during that 32-year period, was less than a million dollars, considerably below the net loss in the one robbery of the Brinks office in Boston, which was a highly protected situation.

Mr. BROOKS. I would say in concurrence that it certainly is an outstanding record and according to the Federal Reserve records, out of shipments totaling $157 billion in currency and coin for the years 1952 through 1959 the total losses amounted to $177,024, of which $23,458 was recovered by the postal inspectors.

I would submit this as exhibits 7A, 7B, and 7C, with the short paragraph at the conclusion of it.

(The summary, exhibits 7A, 7B, and 7C, follows:)

EXHIBIT 7A-SUMMARY OF MONEY SHIPMENTS, LOSSES, RECOVERIES, AND

1 Shipments are on a fiscal year basis ending Nov. 30; other data on a calendar year basis. We do not know the value of shipments made through the U.S. Post Office.

Reported recoveries for period includes recoveries for losses sustained in prior year(s). 4 Not shown.

• Includes losses sustained during prior years.

Source: Computation of percentage ratios for sharing distributable losses under loss sharing agreement for the years 1952 to 1962 prepared by the Insurance Committee of the Federal Reserve Banks, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, Chicago, Ill.

EXHIBIT 7B-SUMMARY OF SHIPMENTS OF CURRENCY, COIN, AND SECURITIES BY MAJOR CLASSIFICATIONS AS SHOWN BY TABULATIONS OF THE INSURANCE COMMITTEE OF THE FEDERAL RESERVE BANKS

1 We do not know the value of shipments made through the U.S. Post Office.
2 Securities at declared insurable value.
Not available.

Source: Computation of percentage ratios for sharing distributable losses under loss sharing agreement for the years 1953 to 1960 prepared by the Insurance Committee of the Federal Reserve Banks, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, Chicago, Ill.

EXHIBIT 7C-SUMMARY OF INDEMNITY CLAIMS PAID BY U.S. POST OFFICES

1 Delete indemnity payment pertains to losses on prior year shipments. Source: Computation of Percentage Ratios for Sharing Distributable Losses Under Loss Sharing Agreement for the years 1952 to 1962 prepared by the Insurance Committee of the Federal Reserve Banks, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, Chicago 90, Illinois.

The above totals include all postal registered mail shipments and, in addition, coin shipments which are handled predominantly by the Railway Express Agency. According to officials of the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, no armored truck shipments are included in these totals.

Mr. BROOKS. I would like to ask you, sir: I note that both the men on the truck in this last robbery were armed with pistols. Are postal employees generally qualified in the use of these weapons?

Mr. DAY. Only a limited number of postal employees have firearms. As I mentioned, the recommendation made by a majority of the regional directors of the Post Office back in the late 1950's was that we should dispense entirely with any firearms in the Post Office, but it was decided at that time, in 1958, that they would have them for a limited number of employees, those that were consigned to convoying, as guards on valuable shipments. Those who are collectors of registers containing money coming in from stations and branches of the Post Office, clerks on railway post offices and highway post offices who have jurisdiction over registered mail, and also the clerks within post offices who have responsibility for registers and for money orders. It is a comparatively small proportion of our employees. For that group we issued in 1959 to each of our offices of substantial size, all the first- and second-class post offices, a detailed training program in a printed bulletin for the use of firearms, the care of firearms, target practice, protective positions, and the complete information necessary for adequate use of firearms by people on a guard duty.

Some of our post offices have had quite extensive programs of setting up ranges and having target practice and that program is being extended as the facilities are available.

We have already completed the part of the program which involves having a trained instructor available in each of the major post offices.

NO HAZARD PAY FOR ARMED GUARDS

Mr. WALLHAUSER. On this point, Mr. Chairman, are these employees considered to have extrahazardous duties and are they given extrahazardous pay, or is this part of their job classification?

Mr. DAY. No, they are not. I think the fact that there haven't been any deaths or injuries since 1926 tends to

Mr. WALLHAUSER. Are they paid at a higher rate than the average employee?

Mr. DAY. No, they are not.

Mr. WALLHAUSER. Shouldn't they be?

Mr. DAY. No, I don't believe so, because of the fact that the hazard has not, in fact, existed.

Mr. WALLHAUSER. Well, the hazard is there, whether or not it has actually occurred. Certainly there is a hazard if a man has to wear a gun to protect

Mr. DAY. I think that we subject our employees, as a statistical matter, to far more hazard by sending them out into public streets to drive trucks in traffic than we do by them having a gun.

Mr. WALLHAUSER. If there is no hazard, then I respectfully suggest you withdraw the guns. There certainly must be a hazard, General; I don't want to labor the point with you, but you certainly wouldn't put guns on a man if there wasn't a hazard involved, beyond what the average citizen requires.

It is my recommendation, surely, that these persons should be given extrahazardous pay, or something should be taken into account to put them at a higher level, or some other means should be found to pay them properly for the extra hazards that, in my opinion, they are taking.

Mr. DAY. Well, I think that many people, for example, keep firearms in their houses, but I don't think that the normal residence is considered a hazardous place.

Mr. WALLHAUSER. No, but they don't go around wearing them to prevent burglars from coming in. I don't think the two examples, if I may respectfully say so, are really to the point.

Mr. DAY. As I say, the whole matter of having any firearms at all in the postal service, or in a postal service, has been a subject of argument back and forth over the years. We did not have any in the Post Office up until 1921. In 1957 there was a very strong recommendation that they be dropped entirely for all types of employees under all circumstances.

We do have them in the limited circumstances. and England they do not use them at all.

And in Canada

Mr. WALLHAUSER. I would say adopt one plan or the other, but whatever plan you adopt should take into account the extrahazardous duties, in my judgment.

ARM GUARDS WITH SAWED-OFF SHOTGUNS?

Mr. BROOKS. Thank you, Mr. Wallhauser.

General, out in the West they used to have stagecoach guards and they always carried a sawed-off shotgun, and it seems fairly effective at close range. I wonder, have they ever considered arming the guards with "Handy Andy" 12-gauge sawed-off shotguns?

Seriously, as I told you, I might miss Fred Belen with a 2-inch barrel, but I can get him dead as a snake with a shotgun from here. You are in the way, but I could get him.

Mr. DAY. I wish you could use another example, because he is an indispensible man. [Laughter.]

There were a few shotguns used in the postal service, Mr. Chairman, in the 1920's. There was a decision made, as I mentioned, that most of the weapons in use in the postal service had become obsolete and they were called in and 38's were substituted, and at the time the weapons in the post offices were called in there were about 125 shotguns involved.

The problem with shotguns, I am sure, is something we could all extemporize on. The matter of using a shotgun where there are other people around is a very dangerous one and most of our people who are carrying firearms are carrying them only incidental to the performance of other duties and are not primarily on guard duty. For example, our registry clerks in railway post offices and highway post offices are busy sorting mail; they aren't standing around on guard duty like a guard in prison.

Mr. BROOKS. General, according to the newspapers after the guards were released they reported they had been robbed of over a million dollars. Do postal employees generally know when they are carrying large numbers of money in registered mail pouches?

Mr. DAY. They know-they can make a very good surmise that they are carrying large sums of money, but they do not properly know how much and I have not gotten confirmation to the fact that these employees did, in fact, make any such statement.

Mr. BROOKS. From your answers up to this point, it would indicate that the shipment of currency by truck is considerably more hazardous than shipping it by rail.

FEWER TRAINS AVAILABLE EVERY YEAR

Mr. DAY. That is true. That is unavoidable by product of the fact that there are fewer and fewer trains available every year. In 1932, just 30 years ago, we had about 10,000 mail-carrying trains available every day. Now that is down to 1,400, or 14 percent as many available every day. There was a large reduction in the number of miles served by railroads and this situation on Cape Cod, for example, is a case where there has not been railroad service available to carry mail for many years.

In 1930 there were 225,000 miles of railroad in the United States on which passenger service was operated and, as I say, that involved 10,000 mail-carrying trains per day. By 1962 the number of miles of railroad on which passenger service is operated had been reduced to 86,000, and it involved less than 1,400 mail-carrying trains, not only fewer miles covered by railroads but also a great reduction in the selection of times of day when railroads are departing.

Mr. BROOKS. General, I agree, then, with you that certainly the problems of transporting currency have increased as a result of this shortage of cutting the curtailment of railroad service and the increase in your truck services.

I would ask you at this time, sir, if we might call for a few moments the guards who were on that job and then return to you. I hope we can conclude this hearing by noon, if we move along, and if we can call the guards now, sir, we will take about a 5-minute recess and settle down a bit.