EXPERIMENT STATION RECORD. 



Vol. XVJII. Apku., 1!)07. No. 8. 



The act making appropriation for the National Department of 

 Agriculture is each year becoming a more important factor in the 

 working out of ])ublic policy. The development of the Department 

 has gradually led up to a variety of large national questions, and the 

 consideration of the agricultural appropriation bill in Congress is 

 made the occasion of extended discussion of these broad questions out 

 of which a public policy relating to them is being developed. The 

 bill frequently receives more attention than that for any other execu- 

 tive department, this attention being far out of proportion to the 

 amount of money involved, although not to the importance of the 

 subject matter itself. The greatly increased interest in agriculture in 

 a national sense and in the Department's work has grown out of an 

 increased realization of the importance of agriculture as a great basic 

 industry, largely contributory to wealth, production, commerce, and 

 other industries, and touching the interests and prosperity of the 

 country and the people as a whole. 



Last year the Federal meat inspection law was enlarged and greatly 

 developed so as to place the Department in control of all meat prod- 

 ucts for interstate commerce and for export, and of the sanitary 

 conditions of the establishments where they are prepared. The act 

 also established the policy relating to the management of the forest 

 reserves, and interpreted the Adams Act doubling the appropriation 

 for agricultural experiment stations. 



This year the appropriation act also conti\ined important legisla- 

 tion relating to the management of funds arising from the forest 

 reserves, carried a permanent increase for agricultural education 

 whicli will double the present appropriation in five years, extended 

 the Federal inspection to include human foods, and increased the aid 

 to be given in the eradication of the Texas fever cattle tick in the 

 South, and the gypsy and brown-tail moths in the New Enghind 

 States. A proposition looking to the protection of the grazing lands 

 of the public domain, by placing them under the control of the Sec- 

 retary of Agriculture, with authority to organize grazing districts, 

 to regulate their use, issue permits or leases, etc., was consider(Ml at 

 length but failed of passage. 



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