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On Tue, 17 May 1994, Mark Levinson wrote:
(stuff deleted)
> ** N.Y. with periods? Must be a mistake.
> The two-letter abbreviations were conceived
> without periods.
> Nobody would put periods into the M.A. for
> Massachusetts, I'm sure...
It seems to me that the abbreviation of a state's name is several
different issues:
1) the US Postal Service has codes for the states: CA, TN, NY, etc.
These are not abbreviations. They are code names for the states. They
are written with both letters capitalized. These were introduced in
order to simplify the addressing of envelopes: one used to write Calif.,
Tenn., N.Y., etc. Note the confusion of states such as Idaho.
2) The abbreviation of a state's name is however not dependant on some
office's internal code standard (which may be widely used). Texas is
properly abbreviated Tex. and Tennessee is Tenn.
Europeans distinguish between a country's postal code (Germany is D) and
its abbreviation. Germany is BRD or FRG (in English).
In writing a sentence, I would write Tex. and in writing an address, I
would write TX.
