No. 6. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 50^ 



ADDRESS DBLIVKRKD BEFORE THE NATIONAL 

 LIVE STOCK ASSOCIATION, CHICAGO, DEC. 8, 

 1901. 



BY LEONARD PEARSON, State VeterinaHan of Penna. 



Ml', Chairman: I ask to be heard ou this occasion as a delegate 

 from au eastern State, the great dairy State of reuusylvania. 



The Grout bill, which ijroposes to put a tax on colored oleomar- 

 garine and to place the responsibility for the enforcement of this 

 measure upon the federal authorities, is not a bill to interfere with 

 the sale of uncolored oleomargarine, the poor man's substitute for 

 butter, nor to tax oleomargarine out of existence. It is merely, as 

 has been well said, to tax the fraud out of oleomargarine, for col- 

 ored oleomargarine is a fraud, it is colored to imitate butter, so that 

 it may be sold as butter to people who want butter, ask for butter 

 and pay for butter. It is not colored for any other earthly reason. 

 The purpose of the Grout bill is not to increase the cost of living, nor 

 to prevent the cheapening of the diet of the workingman; it will not 

 do this. It is to insure the sale of oleomargarine for what it is, aod 

 if it is sold for what it is, the workingman who wants it will get it 

 cheaper than he will if it is colored and sold to him as butter. It 

 is a bill to prevent counterfeiting, to prevent fraud; this and nothing 

 more. 



This Association has in the past put itself on record as opposed to 

 the Grout bill. This action is construed in the east as in opposition 

 to the dairy iudustry. I hajjpeu to belong to four representative 

 associations of live stock men in Pennsylvania, none of which are 

 members of this Association on account of the impression that this 

 organization is the friend of bull butter as against cow butter. The 

 Pennsylvania Breeder's Association, the Peuosylvania State Dairy 

 Union and the Pennsylvania Jersey Cattle Club have not joined with 

 you for this reason. The Pennsylvania Guernsey Breeder's Associa- 

 tion was a member and withdrew after your hostile action o-n the 

 Grout bill last year. 



All that the dairy farmers of the east want is protection against 

 unfair, dishonest competition. Many States have endeavored to 

 protect jhomselves against this fraud by the enactment of State 



