The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1906-05-03

showing with a bad product they take
risks with aduterants which are some
what dangerous to consumers and against
which consumers have the right to be
protected. On the other hand if the bill
should pass the law will not be one
which will prevent any honest producer
of prepared food from doing business
upon reasonable margin of profit, and if
green peas are gray or tomato catsup is
brown instead of crimson, it will be be-
cause the quality of the goods is i'm
proved.
The Question Long Agitated.
Massachusetts passed a pure food law
in 1888 in response to a demand of some
years standing. Since that time similar
laws have been enacted in number Of
states and twenty-five states are now
seriously considering the question of maxi
ing and enforcing laws against impure
foods. Laws to insure the purity of dairy
products are enforced in only three
states at present, but the movement is
growing.
The lobby against the Hepburn pure
food bill has been maintained by interests
whose good faith is questionable because
they deal in the commodities whose purity
the law would, or would seek to, insure.
No better proof of the bad faith of some
of the manufacturers could be desired
than that they have sought to evade
state laws as to personalities by stat
ing that the preservatives We're worth
more than the food products
The state laws provided that no for
eign substance should be used so as to
lower or depreciate or injuriously affect
the quality strength or purity of the
article. Benzoate of soda has a greater
commercial value, pound for pound, than
tomatoes, and the manufacturers set up
the/plea that this being true its use as
preventative did not deprecate the
quality of tomatoes made into catsup.
Adulteration Defined.
Enemies of the pure food bill have
sought to show that adulterated foods are
not necessarily mwholesome. This is
true. But the advocates of the law con-
| tend that the censurer has nevertheless
! the right to know what he is buying.
| Commercial starch, it is pointed out by
| the bureau of chemistry, may be added
| to sausage to increase its weight or per-
| nit the use of more water and fat meat
and the product may be not unwhole-
| some although adulterated. But il the
| sausage is sold simply as sausage and
! the customer buys it without knowing
that a substance has been added to in
| crease its weight without increasing its
nutrtive value, the product Is misbranded
| and the consumer is defrauded. 1t Is In
| this connection that the term "misbrand-
ed" as contradstinguished from "adul-
terated is used in the pure food bill.
Another Unfair Argument.
A favorite argument of enemies of the
| pure food law Is that products may be
colored without being injured. This is
| true, but in many instances coloring mat
ter is used to hide the inferiority or con-
ceal the actual character Of misbranded
goods 1t is this that the proposed law
would prevent.
Another provision of the pure food bill
would protect the consumer from paying
fancy prioes-or any other sort OF prices
for goods branded as being made In one
state or country when they never came
from that state or country. 1t would
prevent kentucky whisky beverages are
included, from being initiated in other
states or initiated in Kentucky and foisted
upon buyers in other states as a Ken
lucky whisky at the expense of the
states reputation, and at the expense of
the defrauded consumer, and for the en-
richment of the persons perpetrating the
fraud.
Producers of pork products have argued
In Washington this winter that certain
preservatives objected to are less harm
full than weed smoke, salt and apple vine
gar. The bureau of chemistry knocks this
argument into a cooked hat by a state
ment that the experiments by Dr. Wiley
show that the chemical personalities can
not be regarded as entirely wholesome
| even in the small quantities in which they
| are applied to foods. The bureau con-
dennis the use of boric acid, formalde-
hyde forids, salicylic acid and benzoic
acid are injurious as preservatlves.
New Kind of Fraud.
! A new form of fraud is the sale of COM
mercial preservatives which are said to
conform to pure food laws and not to
| contain the chemicals mentioned.
| Statements in their behalf are. accord
| ing to DIR. Wiley untrue. These preserva-
| tives sometimes victimize small manu-
| facturers who are led to believe that they
cannot be detected. Many housekeepers
have also been imposed upon by CONNER
cial preservatives for ''cold process pre-
serves
| Experiments in the bureau of chemistry
have shown that coal tar derivatives used
for coorng feeds, and mixed sometimes
with arsenic, are of varying degrees of
strength and may or may not affect
health, but they are frauds in that they