Beginning in 1845, the U.S. Postal Service contacted out mail delivery on some routes that had unusual service circumstances. The primary terms of the contact was mail delivery with “celerity, certainty, and security.” These terms became so standardized that they were represented with three stars and generated the name for the service, Star Route Service. The star-route contracts gave the contractor the flexibility to choose the means of mail delivery:
Star Route contractors relied on a remarkable variety of vehicles to travel across difficult terrain in all kinds of weather. A route from Bayfield to Lapointe, Wisconsin, utilized horse, dogsled, foot travel, a propeller-driven sled, trucks, and a boat, depending on time of year. Another from Yellow Pine to Wallace Ranch, Idaho, employed a pickup truck, 4-wheel drive truck, Sno-Cat®, airplane, horseback, packhorse, motorcycle, foot travel, and snowshoes.
Over time, high-level corruption developed in the awarding of star-route contacts. To control corruption and to provide more transparency in contracting, the contracts shifted to specifying routes and means of delivery. Economically efficient, technology-neutral contracts did not endure because general ethical standards were poor.
Public regulation that enables the benefits of private choice depends on virtuous public officials and ethical private businesspersons.