Commissioner of Agriculture 315 



IMMEDIATE COST OF SI.Al OUTER OF ALL INFECTED FLOCKS AND HERDS 



The comparison of the direct and immediate cost of the slaugh- 

 ter system on the one hand and the cessation of movement system 

 on the other, is largely in favor of the latter. The stock owner 

 himself recognizes this as soon as he learns how mild and tran- 

 sient is the disease, and how lacking in fatalities. The letter and 

 viva voce appeals that I have had on this subject, were rather dis- 

 concerting to one who was involved in the slaughter system and 

 yet was fully convinced that it was not the best. One class came 

 with their sure cures which infallibly secured recovery in 15 or 

 20 days (the disease itself had already provided for that without 

 their help). Others paraded the hecatombs of slain, most of them 

 healthy, and the great trenches filled with their scores and hun- 

 dreds of animals, in excellent condition for the butcher, or that 

 could have been made so in a few weeks. Others quoted the high 

 prices of meat, the privations to which the public were subjected 

 for lack of it, and the still higher prices which must follow such a 

 wanton destruction of wholesome food. Others bewailed the loss 

 of dairy products which must follow the destruction of herds. 

 Still others were concerned as to the destruction of the fodders 

 which the infected animals could have safely consumed had they 

 been preserved. These are but examples of arguments which from 

 their standpoints were unanswerable. 



One could but acknowledge the truth of their positions and 

 plead in extenuation that existing conditions were such that any 

 attempt to stop the slaughter system at the moment would be 

 likely to prove far more harmful than beneficial. The disease 

 was in our midst and daily advancing; it was far more important 

 that we should, at the earliest possible moment, learn the exact 

 location of every infected center and stop the advance than it was 

 to save the herds that must be already involved. The federal 

 government stood ready with a large staff of trained inspectors 

 to trace out every line of infection, at its own expense, and to 

 pay 66 2/3 per cent, of the cost of all herds condemned; but this 

 federal help was conditioned on a vigorous application of the 

 slaughter system. To delay action in order to discuss the relative 

 merits of a system of slaughter and one of rigid arrest of all 

 movement would be but to contribute largely to the extension of 



