The Montgomery advertiser., 1905-04-17
WHAT AMERICANS EAT
PEOPLE NOT PROTECTED FROM
 FOOD ADULTERATION.
An Interesting and Instructive Inter- view With Editor Paul Pierce of Chicago-NatiOnal Food
 LegisIatlOn.
Advertiser Bureau,
 Colorado Buildings. Washington, April Is

Washington. April Is. Paul Pierce of Chicago, editor or What To Eat" the official organ Of the National Association of State Dairy and Food Departments, is in Washing ton in the interest of national food leg isIation, and for the purpose of making further investigation into the connec- tion between certain whiskey interests and leading advocates of the late pure food bill.
 America Is the only civilized nation in the world that has no national law to protect it's people from food adui- terations," said MT. Pierce at the New Willard today, and food manufactnr- CTS take advantage of this omission. We have heard much of the oil kings, the steel and railroad magnates, the coal barons. the bloated bond-holders and lords of real estate, but little has been said about the n4oneyed kings in the ranks of fraudulent and deleterious food manufacturers, who. as class, and possibly as individuals, control more capital than representatives or many other classes of industry corn- bined Chemists tell us that many of the chemicals used fn foods are pois- onous. Experiments have shown them to be detrimental to health. One lead
 ing chemist says: We eat thirty-fve doses of poisonous chemicals day. As to the children. experiments rave shown that where families on one street were supplied with pure milk, the children grew strong and healthy, whereas. the families that were sup piled with the usual city milk in the same locality suffered. When you take
 the total deaths in this country, how many, especially of the young, are poisoned by bad feeding, unSanitary conditions Ignorance, drunkenness and poisoned food and milk? And it does not make any difference whether for
 maldehyde in milk kills ten thousand
 or one million, If It kills a single baby
 1t is an awful wrong to put it in the
 milk; but look at the figures.
 Henry Irving Dodge has recently
 published, in a leading magazine, an
 article on food adulteration. It ,s lis
 second chapter of the article on this
 subject and is run under the caption
 How the Baby Pays the Tax In this article 1t appears from the editors note
 that 1t was prepared with the co-optr-
 ation of the chief of the division of
 foods of the United States Bureau of
 Chemistry. MT. Dodge says: During
 the year 1904 77,9S5 persons died in the
 metropolis. Of these 1852 were un- der 3 years old.' Health Commissioner
 Darlington says that one-half of .he
 infant mortality Is due to stomach or
 bowel diseases. Babies under ? years
 old feed almost absolutely on milk. A
 high official of the New York Health
 Department says: No doubt if we
 could get pure milk, mortality of ln-
 fants would decrease 50 per cent
 These figures are based on babies un-
 der years old in one city only Take children under 5, and what an alarming mortality from bad feeding and poison
 ed food. Here is the field for some of our millionaire philanthropis;s. Let them give the babitS pure milk--the children pure food-ts-d d let them help
 us in this fight for food legislation against the great odds we are contend ing.
 "Putresence of conditions on which Americans are dependent for protection from the life-destroying adulterated foods that now flood our markets" con- tinued Mir Pierce, "are revealed more clearly than ever in the efforts of Sec retary Allen of the National Associa- tion of State Dairy and Food Depart ments to justify his conduct in work ing so arduously for one of the fac tions in wniskey war at a time when the duties of a food officer calls for the highest honor and the most conscien tious labor MT. Allen admits practi cally all the charges made against him. but attempts to justify himself by
 
 mittee of the National Association of State Dairy and Food Departments. From MT. Aliens statements it would appear that the object of the National of State Dairy and Food Departments is more to promote the cause of certain whiskey interests than to fight food adulterations. Surely. the poor food cause of America has sunk to a low and impotent stage if food od WbiSkaU inter- ests in order to finance their crusade against poisonous foods 1t is to work for the cause of pure food for our wives and little children that we regard as our principal task and not to advance the sale of certain brands of whiskey as Is seemingly MT. Aliens interpreta- tion of his duty. which view appears to to be held by others interested.
 While I have supported in every way possible. the National Association of State Dairy and Food Departments and the splendid work that Is being done by our State Food Commission CTS" MT. Pierce continued. "at tn" same time I have attacked food offi- cials whom I considered were not de- voting their attention in the manner they should towards stopping food frauds. When terrible conditions are existing in this country, due to poison ous adulterations and impure foods, when deadly connections are being placed on the market by fraudulent food manufacturers, and when baby killing food adulterators are permitted to stalk forth among us, b!ighting our homes, feeding on the lives of our chill dren to fatten their purses, 1t Is time that pure food workers regard some other subject of greater import than whiskey. My criticism against food officials for devoting so much of their time to whiskey interests has resulted in their agreeing to allow no whiskey trade interest to be represented on the floor of their national convention to be | held in Portland Oregon, in July"
 R. H. Watkins.
 x,,,s- Ahx,o,oa