No post master or privileged person can leave his frank behind him upon envelopes to cover his correspondence in his absence.
Money and other valuable things, sent in the mail, are at the risk of the owner. But, if they be lost, the Department will make every effort in its power to discover the cause, and, if there has been a theft, to punish the offender.
Letters can be registered on the payment of the registry fee of five cents for each letter.
Post masters, assistants, and clerks, regularly employed and engaged in post-offices, and also post riders and drivers of mail stages, are by law exempt from military duty and serving on juries, and from any fine or penalty for neglect thereof.—Act of 1825, sec. 35; Act of 1836, sec. 34.
A post master will suffer no person whatever, except his duly sworn assistants, or clerks and letter carriers, who may also have been sworn, to have access to the letters, newspapers, and packets in his office, or whatever constitutes a part of the mail, or to the mail locks or keys.
If no special order upon the subject has been made in regard to his office, a post master is allowed seven minutes only to change the mail.
If the mail be carried in a stage, coach, or sulky, it will be the duty of the driver to deliver it as near the door of the post-office as he can come with his vehicle, but not to leave his horses, and he should not be permitted to throw the mail on the ground.
Post masters will not suffer newspapers to be read in their offices by persons to whom they are not addressed; nor to be lent out in any case, without permission of the owners.
If newspapers are not taken out of the office by the person to whom they are addressed, the post master will give immediate notice to the publishers, and of the cause thereof if known.
Packets of every description, weighing more than four pounds, are to be excluded, except public documents, printed by order of either House of Congress, or such publications or books as have been or may be published, procured, or purchased, by order of either House of Congress, or joint resolution of the two Houses, and legally franked.