66 UNITED STATES - AGRICUI,TURAL ECONOMY IN GENERAL, 



who are fruit growers or shippers of fruit, the county horticultural com- 

 missioner or board of supervisors... shall immediately remove said inspector 

 for neglect of duty, malfeasance in office or general unfitness for office.... 

 " Any person, firm, company, corporation or organization who shall 

 knowingly pack, or cause to be packed, fruit of the kinds specified herein, 

 in boxes, crates, packages, containers or sub-containers, to be offered 

 for sale or transportation for sale, in wilful violation of this Act, shall be 

 guilty of a misdemeanour. " ^ 



b) The Application of the Law. — This law was originally drafted 

 by a committee of interested growers and consigners in consultation with 

 the State horticultural commissioner. It was amended many times but 

 always b^^ it§ friends. 



Various counties had tried for some years to accomplish the desired 

 regulation of packing by agreements with the growers, the transporting 

 companies or both ; but saving in the case of Eldorado and Placer counties 

 their success was no more than partial or temporary. In Eldorado and 

 Placer counties the voluntary associations of shippers and growers issued 

 printed rules and diagrams which were posted in the orchard packing 

 houses. The scheme worked exceedingly well where the shipping firms 

 co-operated and refused an^^ package below the standard, but otherwise 

 the need of vState authority for the inspectors was seen. The present law 

 was largely based on experience of these regulations, and thus it emanated 

 from the industry itself and public sentiment had been to some extent pre- 

 pared for it. 



The law has helped the grower because it has raised prices, largely 

 as a result of the better standard reached by the fruit. It has helped the 

 consumer and the general pubhc because the improvement in quality has 

 outweighed the increase in prices. It has benefited the transport companies 

 who have received, with the better prices, more for their work, and have 

 been able to show better profits to their stockholders. 



The absolute impossibility of an examination by the inspectors of 

 ever\^ packed box of fruit is apparent. The greatest good can be accom- 

 plished only when the frviit growers, packers and shippers themselves are 

 in sympathy with the work and wilHng to co-operate with the inspectors 

 by conforming to specifications. It was this co-operation of growers, 

 packers and shippers with county horticultiiral commissioners, in San Joa- 

 quin, Fresno, Sacramento and other counties growing table grapes, which 

 made possible last year an efficiently standardized packing of grapes re- 

 sulting in splendid prices. 



In the first year for which the law was in force about 20,000 carloads 

 of fresh deciduous frmt were subject to its provisions. The experiment 

 was entirely satisfactory, eastern buyers referring to the " marvelloush' 

 scientific pack of CaUfornia fruit ". Thousands of crates of fruit were re- 

 jected, but the grade of the consignments was raised many per cent, with 

 comparatively little injury to anyone and extremely low administrative 

 costs. Many thousands of doUars were added to the industr>^ 



c) Suggested Modifications. — The chief abuses which the law sought 



