The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1904-03-30
NEW LAW FOUND.
Provides For Inspection and
License Tax on Fertilizer.
Only Few Firms Have Complied
With Statute.
PENALTY is SEVERE.
Stuff Sold Must Be Up to
Standard.
Samples to Be Deposited With
State Board.

The state department of agriculture
is wrestling with the new fertilizer law.
This is the statute passed by the last
legislature requiring the secretary of
the state board of agriculture to look
after commercial fertilizers which are
offert,- for sale in Kansas and see that
they are up to standard.
No one connected with the state
board Of agriculture knew anything
about the law until months after it had
been adopted. In running through the
new statute book one day Assistant
secretary Mohler found it accidentally,
which was the first he knew of the ex-
istence of such a law.
1t requires the manufacturers of
commercial fertilizers to file with the
department of agriculture a sample of
at least one pound, in a sealed glass
jar. and the manufacturers must pay
license of 500 a year for each brand
of fertilizer. The proceeds from the
licenses go to pay for having analyses
made and the balance goes into the
agricultural fund.-" whatever that is.
These licenses must be paid each year
before May l. The law did not go into
effect until the publication of the
statute book last June, so this is the
first time the licenses have become due,
now looking the matter up.
Thus far licenses have been taken
out for the sale of eleven brands of
commercial fertilizer. The Swift Pack
ing company has five brands, a st.
Louis firm has three, and the Cudahy
Packing company has one. The Armour
people have filed samples of six brands
but they have not yet paid the license
fees on them.
The law provides that the secretary
of the state board of agriculture or
some one whom he appoints shall be
authorized to go into the stores of deal
ers in commercial fertilizers and take
sample of not less than two pounds Of
any Oh sale for analysis and comparison
with the official sample, and if it is
not up to the standard as printed on the
label, which the law requires. the deal
er is subject to heavy penalty.
There is no compensation provided for
this work and no money appropriated
for paying for the samples taken from
the dealers. Accordingly Assistant Sec
retary Mohler looked up the author of
the bill, found it to be Representative
E. B. Schermerhorn of Cherokee coun-
ty, and he has deputized Mr.. Schermer-
horn to secure samples as specified in
the law.
The penalty for the violation of the
law is all placed on the dealer who sells
the fertilizer and not on the manufac-
turer or wholesaler. The law makes
the dealer liable in a civil action for a
penalty OF not less Cnan TWO hundred
dollars on the first offense and not less
than five hundred dollars on subsequent
offenses, and for damages to any pur-
chaser who has been injured by the
purchase of fraudulent fertilizer A
criminal penalty of a fine of not more
than two hundred dollars or not more
than thirty days in jail is also pro-
vided.
There are doubtless many people in the
state who do not know of the existence
of this law and who might fall into its
provisions without realizing 1t. If any fer
tilizer is sold without the proper label and
analysis on the outside it is a violation of
the law and the dealer is subject to the
penalty.
Mr. Mohler believes that the state ex-
pertinent station should be given the au-
thority to make the analysis of fertilizers
and to enforce the law instead of placing
that duty upon the secretary of the state
board of agriculture, because the expert
ment station has facilities for making the
analysis while the board of agriculture
has not and has to send the samples to
the experiment station anyway. Arrange
mentS have already been made with Prof.
J. T. Willard, chemist of the Kansas ex-
pertinent station at Manhattan, to make
the analysis this spring
These fertilizers are not yet used in
Kansas to any great extent, compared
to what they are in older states There
is some use made of them in the south
eastern part of the state and In scattered
portions of the eastern third of Kansas,
but they are practically unknown in CEN
trail and western Kansas and very few
farmers. need them in eastern Kansas ex-
cept in isolated cases