THIRD ANNUAL YEAR ROOK — PART VIII. 463 



packed in a tub or firkin the words "Renovated butter." In case he puts 

 up his butter in bricks or rolls of not less than one pound, the successive 

 papers or wrappers in which the print or roll is contained must also bear 

 the words "Renovated butter." The outide of the original package, whether 

 it be a tub containing a solid mass of butter, or a box of any kind containing 

 a number of bricks or rolls, must also bear the words "Renovated 

 butter." The manufacturer may also use a brand, giving his own name 

 and words or marks descriptive of the quality of his product, provided 

 the brands do not cover up the stamps or the other marks required by 

 the law. From these provisions, it will be seen that, except in the case 

 of butter packed in solid mass to be divided when retailed, the butter and 

 all of its containers, or any of them, will always show the words 

 "Renovated butter," unless the retailer removes the print or roll from 

 its original package, erases the word "Renovated butter" pressed upon 

 the butter itself, and re-wraps it. If he does this, he runs counter to the 

 general provisions of internal revenue laws and the special rule of 

 the secretaries of the treasury and agriculture, which provides that the 

 butter must be retained in its "original package bearing the tax stamp 

 and other prescribed marks until it is delivered to the consumer or pur- 

 chaser in retail trade." The renovated butter, which may be packed 

 in solid mass, must also be kept in its original package; but in this 

 form might be easily sold to the purchaser for creamery butter. But 

 when renovated butter is sold in bricks and in accordance with all the 

 provisions of the law, the purchaser will invariably be informed as to the 

 product he is buying. The difference in price between renovated butter 

 and creamery butter is so small that scarcely any retailer would take 

 the risk of violating the internal revenue law for the sake of the small 

 additional profit he might make by so doing. The creamery man and the 

 maker of dairy butter as well will find it to his interest to encourage the 

 retail sale of butter in bricks and prints., instead of in other forms, so 

 that the purchaser may know at any rate that they are not receiving 

 renovated butter and paying for creamery butter. 



Before this new law went into effect no retailer of butter in Iowa 

 ver sold any renovated butter. He invariably sold creamery butter or 

 dairy bricks, or butter with some other euphonious title. Even now some 

 retailers attempt to sell renovated butter for creamery butter. These 

 evident intentions to defraud by selling renovated butter in place of a 

 better product, and at the price of a better product, can not always be 

 excused on the theory of the ignorance of the retailer. Formerly he may 

 himself have been deceived by the manufacturer who perhaps was run- 

 ning a creamery; but under the present United States law, he knows 

 invariably what he is buying, and hence, has no possible excuse for at- 

 tempted deception of his patrons. The new law has depressed the retail 

 price of renovated butter in the city of Des Moines about four cents 

 per pound, and probably has depressed the wholesale price to an equal 

 extent, and naturally these decreases in price are visited upon the original 

 makers of the butter from which the renovated butter has been made. It 

 should be noted, however, that this difference in price of packing stock 

 has been caused by the fact that this renovated butter must now be 

 retailed for what it is and must sell on its own merits, and not on the 



