The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1898-11-23
The Senate Must Protect.

recent publication of the statistics Of
the subject, has been paid the farmers
as compensation for diseased cattle
slaughtered by the commissioners. Only
proper and entirely just6able part of
this aggregate sum has been paid to the
commissioners and the veterinaries.
The whole business of the admins
tration Of the law has been managed
with fidelity and skill, and wholesome
regard for the interests of the State.
The sum of money expended, in the
aggregate, is small and inconsiderable
compared with the estimated cost in
1894, when the tuberculosis law, as it is
called, was enacted. The law for the
suppression of this disease in the herds
was the result of careful elaboration.
The condition of health among the
cattle herds at that time was ex-
citing justifiable alarm. 1t was shown
that milk from cows honeycombed with
tuberculosis was used in private fami-
lies, made into butter and cheese and
daily consumed by the people, and that
the meat of such animals was every
where exposed for sale and bought in
discriminatory with wholesome meat
for the breakfast and dinner table. The
prime article of food of the children
was being drawn from animals putrid
with disease.
This was the known condition of
things in 1894 The Legislature was
called on to remedy ii. The law of
that year was enacted in answer to
this imperative demand to protect the
public health. This law has been adj
ministered for four years with striking
efficiency and success. The State is
almost out of the woods. The herds
have been cleaned up to large ex-
tent. Relatively a small amount of
territory remains to be covered by the
work Of the cattle commissioners. The
regions already gone over have been
shown by second testings to be singu-
larly free from the disease. There is
daylight ahead, and assurance amount
ing to certainty that, with reasonable
further expenditure, the State will be
practically freed from the disease and
the menace il is to human health.
Then small annual outlay will easily
maintain such degree of salubrity in
the diaries of Vermont as will give her
products in that leading department
of her farming industry a gratifying
prominence in market for their known
freedom from the faint of loathesome
disease.
This is the status to-day of Ver-
momt's wise policy and judicious eff
forts to eliminate tuberculosis from its
cattle herds. In a sort of frenzy of
combined ignorance, prejudice, misin-
formation and demagogism the House
of Representatives has abolished the
the cattle commission. In full view
Of final success it has voted to
dump the experience and advantage of
four years of labor and expenditure for
one of the most rational and necessary
objects that ever engaged the attention
of the State. This decision has not
been reached with deliberation, it is
not the result of careful investigation;
it is not dictated by intelligence, but is
the work of blind unreasoning fury.
An observance of the proceedings of
the House in the debates on this and the
kindred measure to abolish the board of
agriculture will justify any statement,
however strong, as to the fanatical spirit
with which a measure for the protec-
ton of the public health primarily, and,
secondarily, of the farmers property
interest in his dairy and its products,
has been assailed.
The people, the consumers of milk,
butter, cheese and beef-the great and
overwhelming majority rights in
this matter the Legislature is imper-
atively bound to protect, and if one
branch of that body has demonstrated
its incapacity to deal wisely and tenn
perately with subject of vital import
ance to every man, woman and child
and in an especial manner to the chill
dren-of the State, they must make
their appeals to the other, the Senate
TO save them from the peril to which
the House would again expose them.
The State demands that its large eX-
penditure to accomplish the purpose
O. the law of 1894 shall not be thrown
away in spasm of unrighteous wrath,
but shall be carried along to the near
and final success that awaits it, Here
is, pre- eminetly, an opportunity 70
the exercise of the function that was
leading object in the creation of the
Senate, to interpose check upon the
hasty and ill-advised action of the
House. Every consideration of wise
public policy and regard for the well
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