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A common claim seems to be that mailboxes in the United States are federal property (example, example, example). (To be clear, some mailboxes are owned and maintained by the USPS, typically cluster boxes, but this is referring to mailboxes purchased and installed by property owners.)

The justification for this statement is typically that U.S. code makes mailbox vandalism or use for non-USPS materials a federal crime; thus, USPS has total control over your mailbox. This seems questionable. Obviously, if you go smashing other people's mailboxes or go box to box inserting pamphlets, you are liable to get in trouble with the postal inspector, but that seems unrelated to who owns the mailbox.

In fact, the USPS website seems to acknowledge that some mailboxes are privately owned.

What is the real story here? Are U.S. mailboxes property of the USPS? To what extent do property owners have control over their own mailbox? Can they deface or place non-mail in their own mailbox? Can they tear it down with no intent to replace it?

Dominick Pastore
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    Why would you get in trouble for inserting pamphlets? Are there no door-to-door ad deliveries in the US? – gerrit May 12 '20 at 07:51
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    @gerrit Take a look at the private express statutes and the mailbox monopoly: USPS has a legal monopoly on deliveries to mailboxes. There are door-to-door ad deliveries, but they usually get hung on the door because they aren't supposed to go in the mailbox. – Zach Lipton May 12 '20 at 08:57
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    @ZachLipton Well, bizarre! Now I know why as a kid in Paperboy I was throwing the paper toward the door rather than carefully putting it in the mailbox like in the rest of the world. :-O – gerrit May 12 '20 at 12:05
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    @gerrit Having been an actual paperboy way back in the day, there was often a second box on the same pole with the mailbox specifically for the newspaper. Usually with the paper's logo on the side. Some people would have 2-3 extra boxes if they wanted multiple newspapers. Though most people just wanted it slipped between the front door and the screen or left on the porch. I never threw them at the house like the game, – Darrel Hoffman May 12 '20 at 14:01
  • @DarrelHoffman Apart from the word paperboy being somewhat outdated (can be any age or gender) why would newspaper delivery service be something of the past? Also what if I live in a tower block with 200 apartments and all mailboxes downstairs? – gerrit May 12 '20 at 14:40
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    @gerrit Well, I was referring specifically to my past. I don't know if that's still common practice - I haven't seen those boxes around recently, but I don't live in the same place anymore. I do know that physical newspapers are becoming far less common as people are getting their news from other sources. (Internet, TV, radio, etc.) Many US newspapers are moving to be mostly online, assuming they're not going out of business entirely, so delivery service is indeed becoming more and more a thing of the past.. – Darrel Hoffman May 12 '20 at 14:56
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    What mailboxes are you referring to? I just went to a home improvement store, purchased a mailbox, and will install on my property. How/why would that suddenly become property of the USPS? As for tearing down a mailbox, you don't legally need one. ...however, without a mailbox the USPS will not deliver any mail. – BruceWayne May 12 '20 at 16:27
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    Well, dang! Looks like them durn revenuuers owes me for having replaced THEIR gol-durned mailbox down at the end of my - MY! - driveway I-don't-know-how-many-times! THAT'S IT! If'n they ain't gonna maintain THEIR DANG MAILBOX properly, I ain'ts gonna pay no more taxes!!! GIT MAH SHOTGUN, MAW - WE'S A-GOIN' TO WAR!!! (And, for the humor-impaired - that's a...Ah say, that's a JOKE, son!) (Nice kid, but his elevator don't go all the way to the top floor... :-) – Bob Jarvis - Слава Україні May 12 '20 at 16:38
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    @DarrelHoffman - you guys were paperboys way too late. In the mid 70's there was no second anything around the mailbox, and you could expect a better tip if you aim was good enough to "Porch it". Ah the good old days delivering the Dallas Morning News folding papers at the church on the corner of Dumont and Waterview in Richardson :) -- But we digress. The law and regulations surrounding mailboxes harken back to days long past to a time when the Telephone company owned the 1 telephone in your home and mail delivery was critical to both law and commerce. In that light -- it make more sense. – David C. Rankin May 14 '20 at 04:36
  • "U.S. code makes mailbox vandalism or use for non-USPS materials a federal crime; thus, USPS has total control over your mailbox." : a non sequitur. It is completely unrelated to who owns the mailbox."It is a federal offense to vandalize a mailbox, punishable by a fine up to $250,000 and three years in a federal prison." - "Because a mailbox is personal property, you or your insurance company will be liable for its repair or replacement." otherwise they would be liable for it (read: money). What Happens When You Hit a Mailbox? – Mazura May 14 '20 at 10:22
  • @DavidC.Rankin "In the mid 70's there was no second anything around the mailbox": whatever the reason for the lack of newspaper boxes, it wasn't the era. Such boxes were alive and well in the 1970s where I lived in New Jersey. – phoog Apr 28 '23 at 07:09
  • @phoog chuckling -- it took a few more years for sunlight to be piped down to Texas -- but slowly they are catching up. – David C. Rankin Apr 28 '23 at 07:15

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The real story is that the articles you link to are logically fallacious.

The first hedges its assertions by saying a mailbox is "effectively considered" to be federal property. It cites 18 USC 1705, which it correctly notes "puts your mailbox under Federal jurisdiction." But that's not the same as assuming ownership of it. The piece also says that you "effectively lease" your mailbox to the federal government, which is a somewhat exaggerated way of putting it, but even if we accept it at face value it falls far short of a claim that the mailbox is federal property.

The second concludes that mailbox tampering is a federal offense because "the mailbox belongs to and is controlled by the USPS." There is no evidence offered to support the assertion of ownership, and there is of course an alternative explanation for the fact that mailbox tampering is a federal offense, which is that there are laws such as the aforementioned 18 USC 1705 that prohibit it. These laws, however, say nothing about ownership.

The third is ultimately based on the assertion of a letter carrier who said, "Listen, lady, your friends don’t own these mailboxes. We do." The claim was made in explanation of the prohibition against private individuals putting items into a mailbox. As far as I can see, the article is off the mark in another way: that prohibition has nothing to do with safety and security, but rather with protecting the postal service's revenue: it arises from 18 USC 1725, which explicitly is about avoiding the payment of postage. In any event, it does not establish ownership.

In short, the idea that all mailboxes are federal property is a myth, as implied by the USPS page you link to.

To what extent do property owners have control over their own mailbox?

To a fairly high extent, but they do need to comply with the relevant law. They can't, for example, hang a plastic bottle by the roadside for the purpose of receiving their mail.

Can they deface or place non-mail in their own mailbox?

18 USC 1705 actually prohibits willful or malicious injury, tearing down, or destruction of a mailbox, not defacing. So technically, they could, but a prosecution seems highly unlikely. Under section 1725, placing non-mail in the box is only prohibited to the extent that there is intent to avoid paying postage. That would be difficult to establish for someone putting something in their own mailbox.

Can they tear it down with no intent to replace it?

If they're willing to forego mail delivery, yes. They may be able to arrange to have the mail held for retrieval at the post office. If they do not, their mail will be returned to the sender as undeliverable. This arises from the Domestic Mail Manual, which says (in general) that "customers must provide authorized mail receptacles or door slots" as a condition of city delivery (I could not find a corresponding requirement for rural delivery, but it must exist somewhere). The manual also describes requirements for customer mail receptacles.

phoog
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    "but a prosecution seems highly unlikely" uses a poorly chosen conjunction, the sentence deserves simplifying. – Jirka Hanika May 12 '20 at 07:35
  • I don't understand the part about avoiding paying postage... if you are delivering something yourself, why would you need to pay somebody else for what you did? – Andy May 12 '20 at 21:20
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    @Andy - In the US, only the USPS may deliver items in the mailbox. Everyone else, UPS, FedEx, paperboy, etc, must leave items somewhere else. Presumably, one reason that this law was passed is to make delivery more difficult for competitors, thereby encouraging people to use the USPS. – Mattman944 May 12 '20 at 22:54
  • @Mattman944 Could I get a second box besides the official mail box for those other deliveries? – Paŭlo Ebermann May 12 '20 at 23:34
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    @PaŭloEbermann Yes, absolutely. In fact, the vast majority of mailboxes in the US have a box directly underneath the Official USPS Mailbox, mounted on the same pole, precisely for stuff like that. (At least for private homes, anyway. Apartments, condos, etc. typically have all their mailboxes in a central location that doesn't have room for the newspaper box.) – HiddenWindshield May 13 '20 at 04:42
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    @HiddenWindshield those are something you see occasionally, but certainly not for the vast majority of mailboxes.Check a few random Streetviews in residential areas to confirm. – barbecue May 13 '20 at 17:05
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    So, 18 USC 1725 could infer that you can legally put mail in someone else's mailbox as long as you include postage on that mail. Would that be correct? If you included postage then you clearly were not doing it in order to avoid paying for postage, perhaps you were doing it to achieve immediate delivery and didn't care about the postage. I do find 18 USC 1725 to be a bit annoying considering it doesn't allow for me to put something in their mailbox with their permission. I'm glad random people can't legally put things in my mailbox but I'd like to permit certain people to do it since I own it. – Steve Hiner May 13 '20 at 17:33
  • @barbecue Ok, you're right. Which is weird, because I can't drive down the street without seeing the things. Must be a regional thing, then. – HiddenWindshield May 13 '20 at 19:32
  • @HiddenWindshield I'm sure you're right. I see a lot more of them in rural/suburban areas – barbecue May 13 '20 at 19:56
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    @SteveHiner It's easy to forget nowadays, but there was a time when the USPS was widely used to send valuable documents, credit cards, and even cash. People stealing things from mailboxes was a serious problem. People would also stick things in mailboxes that shouldn't be there. Firecrackers, rattlesnakes, dog turds, etc. – barbecue May 13 '20 at 20:00
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    Even the intend to avoid postage seems vague. Here even state officials like labor office put mail in your postbox without stamping it - to ensure punctual delivery in case it's a time sensitive mailing. – eagle275 May 14 '20 at 09:29
  • 'That' sentence deserves to be emboldened. Nobody cares what you're sticking in your own mailbox. What are you going to do, call the cops on yourself? I'd hope they'd slap you with obstruction for wasting time. – Mazura May 14 '20 at 10:58
  • @JirkaHanika what conjunction would you prefer, and how would you simplify the sentence? – phoog May 16 '20 at 02:55
  • @Mattman944 it's not only about delivery. It's actually only legal for a private person or company to carry letters under certain circumstances, which include the letter being stamped with the correct postage, the stamps being canceled by the sender and carrier (39 USC 601(a)), or the charge for the letter being at least 6 times the cost of a 1-ounce first-class letter (39 USC 601(b)). – phoog May 16 '20 at 03:05
  • @Andy If you deliver the letter yourself then you've avoided paying postage on it, unless you delivered it in compliance with 39 USC 601(a) (link in previous comment), in which case you've both delivered it yourself and paid postage on it. The system is designed to protect the government's revenue in its monopoly on mail service, not just to make sure that the government is paid for the services it actually provides. – phoog May 16 '20 at 03:09
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    @SteveHiner 18 USC 1725 implies that, but 39 USC 601(a) says it explicitly (although there are a few other conditions that must also be met). – phoog May 16 '20 at 03:20
  • "So technically, they could deface." The part about prosecution seems to me redundant. If you meant that prosecution would be unlikely if an owner destroyed their own mailbox, feel free to add that (although it's less obvious to me than to you and it's not supported by statute nor well known tolerated practice). If you meant that prosecution would be unlikely if an owner defaced their own mailbox, that would be illogical to point out because if a course of action is clearly legal, it should not be considered for prosecution. – Jirka Hanika May 16 '20 at 05:49