92 STATE HORTICULTURAL SOCIETY. 



YOU positively knew tliat the fruit was just as it was put up because 

 it had been inspected, but after it goes from Benton Harbor to Battle 

 Creek, there is a question about somebody meddling with that package 

 but there is n(jthiiig of the kind if it is inspected at the car. 



A Member: I have learned that there are some dealers in fruits 

 that have complained that fruit from certain states come to them so 

 l)acked under the laws of those states that are in such good working 

 shape that they can implicitly rely upon the contents of the package. That 

 might be one good way to find a good working law, by going to these 

 dealers and find out which states stand high ; study their laws — it may 

 be they will be just what we want. 



A Voice: Idaho stands high. 



Chairman : The reason why we have these laws is to make the most 

 of us behave ourselves. We like to shift it over on* to the other fellow, 

 but sometimes we ourselves, need watching. 



Mr. Morrell : For twenty years we have fought dishonest methods 

 of packing. It did not imi)rove so very much until we got a law. The 

 law in some respects is a very good one. We have reached the first year 

 of the application of the law and it has developed a fault which is 

 really a serious one. Take for example: The hardest of all fruit is the 

 l)each to ship in a package with an easih' removable cover. The State 

 authorities have taken the point of destination as their place of in- 

 spection and they have convicted some men, and among them men that 

 I do not believe ever packed a fraudulent i)ackage of fruit in their lives. 

 I want to say to you, that I believe, and I think you will agree with 

 me, that a package with the covers so easily removable, could be chang- 

 ed back and forth and the fruit taken from one basket to another and 

 when it came to be inspected, perhai)s it had passed through three 

 or four hands and then fixed u]) and then, the penalties for a violation 

 of the law was fastened onto the man who originally packed the fruit 

 and did it all right. In one instance I know of a dealer that changed 

 the fruit and used a basket with a certain grower's cover on it, and 

 it passed as this grower's fruit when the fact is, that this man never 

 used the brand of baskets in which the fruit was found. Such kind 

 of work as this brings embarrassment and loss to the fruit grower and 

 a stigma upon the State of Michigan, as well as the particular locality 

 from which the fruit was supposed to come. 



Now a remedy for this, in my mind, would be that the inspection 

 take jjlace at the point of origin, and before there has been any oppor- 

 tunity for manipulation. 



It is a good law, but if it could be amended so as to change the 

 place of inspection I believe it would liush up a lot of dissatisfaction. 

 I think vre ought to go on record and do all we can to insist upon 

 inspection at point of origin only. 



Mr. Smythe: Will you go on the Legislative Committee down at 

 Lansing this winter? 



A. I have been there once and I will be willing to go again if so 

 desired. 



A Member: In that law there is a clause, that no common carrier 

 shall receive any man's fruit that they do not inspect. I do not think 



