It was considered speedy service on that April day in 1860. Once a week riders set out from St. Joseph to deliver mail to Sacramento, California. In those days, St. Joseph was as far West as the railroad and telegraph went.

The fabled pony express fast delivery service usually took about 10 days to transport mail across the country. Of course, that was considerably faster than sending a letter from New York to San Francisco by steamship. The ship had to travel around the tip of South America because the Panama Canal had not yet been dug.

It is hard for us to imagine. We have grown accustomed to instantaneous communication. Emails and cellular phones can now go with you wherever you go. However, the United States Postal Service still delivers the mail, six days a week in rain, hail, sleet or snow.

Recently, the USPS announced that is was thinking about reducing delivery to five days per week. The Postal Service now competes with not only package delivery services, but also with a new generation of electronic communication.

However my concern is that there are still a large group of people who depend on the Postal Service to deliver their social security checks, needed medicine or even just the latest letter or card from a loved one.

I worry that reducing services will lead to other reductions like closing rural post offices. That would disproportionally affect rural America. I’ve introduced a sense of Congress, asking the postal service to keep mail delivery at 6 days a week.

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