POST-OFFICE PROTECTION INADEQUATE

It is only the biggest and most barefaced scheme that under these
conditions can receive any attention whatsoever from the
department, and even then its force is hopelessly inadequate and
incompetent for the work in hand, work requiring the
highest-class detective ability.

About twelve years ago the Post Office Department ran down and
convicted a swindler, Stephen Balliet, who was selling stock in a
mine full of water in Oregon and was known as "the mining genius
of the Northwest." He was tried three times, finally convicted,
and sent to prison. That case cost the Post Office Department
$18,000, took a man's entire time for two years, and required two
trips across this continent. The Government has not tried since
to get many such convictions.

Perhaps because of the pressure of other work, perhaps for other
causes, investigations of this nature are allowed to languish.
Some years ago, when the firm of Douglas, Lacey & Company was
reaping its harvest, an inspector was assigned to investigate the
concern's operations. He was one of the ablest inspectors of the
service, a man with real detective ability and a knowledge of the
devious ways of certain kinds of financing. He made a trip to
Mexico and subsequently sent in a report to Washington
recommending that a fraud order be issued against the concern and
that its use of the mails be stopped. He waited a long time and
then got word from Washington that more evidence was required. He
made another investigation and sent in another report,
recommending in even stronger language that the mails be barred