Our postal intercourse with foreign countries has kept pace with the
growth of the domestic service. Within the past year several countries
and colonies have declared their adhesion to the Postal Union. It now
includes all those which have an organized postal service except
Bolivia, Costa Rica, New Zealand, and the British colonies in Australia.

As has been already stated, great reductions have recently been made
in the expense of the star-route service. The investigations of the
Department of Justice and the Post-Office Department have resulted in
the presentation of indictments against persons formerly connected with
that service, accusing them of offenses against the United States. I
have enjoined upon the officials who are charged with the conduct of the
cases on the part of the Government, and upon the eminent counsel who
before my accession to the Presidency were called to their assistance,
the duty of prosecuting with the utmost vigor of the law all persons who
may be found chargeable with frauds upon the postal service.

The Acting Attorney-General calls attention to the necessity of
modifying the present system of the courts of the United States--a
necessity due to the large increase of business, especially in the
Supreme Court. Litigation in our Federal tribunals became greatly
expanded after the close of the late war. So long as that expansion
might be attributable to the abnormal condition in which the community
found itself immediately after the return of peace, prudence required
that no change be made in the constitution of our judicial tribunals.
But it has now become apparent that an immense increase of litigation
has directly resulted from the wonderful growth and development of the
country. There is no ground for belief that the business of the United
States courts will ever be less in volume than at present. Indeed, that