The Department of Justice and the Court of Claims, which attend to suits against the Government, and give legal advice to its officers, share the brownstone office building on Pennsylvania Avenue, across the street from the Treasury. The portraits of his predecessors in the Attorney-General's room are all that would be likely to attract a stranger there, unless he were a lawyer interested in the library and the public sessions of the Court of Claims. The Departments of the Interior and of the Post Office occupy several buildings on F Street and elsewhere, the principal two of which are on Seventh Street between G and E streets. As the ranking officer is the Postmaster-General, let us first look at The General Post Office. An irregular and scanty but authorized postal system was organized in the American colonies as early. as 1692 by patent to Thomas Neale. This expired in 1710, when the English postal system was extended to the colonies, and it slowly grew until, in 1753, Benjamin Franklin was appointed Deputy Postmaster-General for the Colonies. The Revolution overthrew the royal mail, but when peace came the Continental Congress established a new system, and put Franklin again in charge of the first United States mails. Postage stamps were not adopted by the Government until 1847, and until lately were printed by private contractors, but are now made at the Bureau of Engraving and Printing. The first building for this department was burned in 1836. The present one covers its site, and has been extended to include the whole square on Seventh Street between E and F streets, back to Eighth Street-300 by 204 feet. The style is a modified Corinthian, designed by Robert Mills and carried out and extended by Walter, who was so long supervising architect of the Treasury. Did it stand out where it could be properly surveyed, it would be regarded as one of the most beautiful of the public edifices. It was not wholly completed until 1855, and then had cost about $2,000,000. The center of the Eighth Street front has an interesting carving representing the railroad and the telegraph. The Dead Letter Office is the only show-part of this hive of workers, though nearly every detail of the daily business would interest visitors. This office is on the F Street front, and signs in the halls direct one to go up-stairs to the visitors' gallery. Here there is first to be seen a museum of the astounding variety of things daily intrusted to the mails, all gathered from parcels that never reached their destination. It would be difficult to think of any class of objects, natural or artificial, which is not represented here, and some of the things are both intrinsically valuable and curious. The gallery beyond looks down upon the crowded room where those clerks sit who examine and dispose of the " dead" mail- that is, those letters and packages which, for some reason (in most cases faulty direction), are never delivered, but are sent here from post offices all over the country. Six or seven million pieces of lost mail are handled here annually. Every letter, newspaper, or parcel is opened by the clerks, and the feverish rapidity with which they make their examinations is fascinating. If any address or clue to ownership is found by which the letter or other article can be returned to the sender or to the addressee, this is at once done; if not, those which contain anything of value are recorded and laid aside for six months, after which time they are sold at auction as unclaimed, and the money turned into the Treasury. The Department of the Interior, whose building is popularly known as the Patent Office, manages internal or domestic affairsthe relations of our own people with the Government. Hence the Secretary of the Interior is charged with the supervision of public business relating to patents for inventions, pensions and bounty lands, the public lands and surveys, the Indians, education, railroads, the geological survey, the census, the National parks, reservations, and various of the public institutions, and has certain power and duties in relation to the Territories. In fact, the department was organized (in 1849) out of the overflow, as it were, of other departments. There was sent to it the Patent Office and Census from the Department of State, the General Land Office from the Treasury, Indian Affairs from the War Department, and the Pension Office from under the control of the War and Navy departments. It is therefore the most extensive as well as miscellaneous department, but its offices offer little to interest the casual sight-seer. He will wish, however, to visit one or two. The Secretary and his assistants * have their offices in the great *The First Assistant Secretary of the Interior considers certain appeals from the Commissioner of the General Land Office; examines charges against officials and employes; instructs mine inspectors; supervises matters pertaining to the Indians, to the distribution of certain public documents, to the Government's charitable and correctional institutions in the District of Columbia, to the National parks and to colleges aided by the Government; and acts as Secretary in the absence of that officer. The Assistant Secretary of the Interior has general supervision of the business of the boards of pension appeals; countersigns letters patent; examines official bonds and contracts; has the admission and disbarment from practice of attorneys and agents, and acts as Secretary in the absence of both that officer and the First Assistant Secretary. The Assistant Attorney-General is the chief law officer of this department. All appeals from the General Land Office are sent to his office for consideration. Oral arguments are heard by him in the more important cases, or by brief; and decisions are prepared under his supervision. |