192 Kansas Academy of Science. 



SOME PROBLEMS CONNECTED WITH THE ADMINIS- 

 TRATION OF THE DRUG END OF THE FOOD-AND- 

 DRUGS LAW. 



By L. E. Sayre, University of Kansas, Lawrence. 



O OME of the problems of administering the drug law relate to 

 ^ the question of meeting certain legal constructions of the law, 

 which seem to evade the application of the spirit of the law, if not 

 the letter. One of the cases in point is where a "cancer cure" was 

 sold in Kansas City, Mo. The manufacturer was prosecuted under 

 the food-and-drugs law, under the charge of shipping misbranded 

 drugs, the government contending that the proprietor of the remedy 

 implied on the label of his illegal remedy that it uiould cure can- 

 cer, and such an implication was an unwarranted falsehood; there- 

 fore the material was to be considered misbranded. When the 

 United States grand jury indicted this "cancer cure," the manu- 

 facturer's attorneys filed a motion to quash the indictment on the 

 ground that the food-and-drugs act applies merely to the composi- 

 tion or ingredients of the medicaments, and not to their thera- 

 peutic effects. In other words, the defense was that so long as an 

 exploiter does not falsify on the label regarding the composition of 

 his nostrum he may misrepresent with impunity concerning its 

 effects. Strange to say, the position of the manufacturer was sus- 

 tained by a federal district judge. Judge Philips said, in closing 

 the case: "At no time in the debate in Congress was it proposed 

 to hold the manufacturers of proprietary medicines to criminal lia- 

 bility for misstatements as to the curative value of their products. 

 It is a strained construction to read it into the statutes. Statements 

 on label of a bottle of medicine as to the curative powers, if re- 

 garded as 'misbranded,' is an entire misconception of the act. 

 Statements as to curative powers would depend on the opinions of 

 contending experts and upon the uses thereof." 



Another case of where the apparent evasion of the law, or the 

 spirit of the law, is made in connection with the question of the 

 application of the letter instead of the spirit, may be illustrated by 

 the following case: A pharmacist orders a w^U-known drug, and is 

 supplied with an article labeled by that name, which, on examina- 

 tion, is found to be adulterated; but the proof that it is adulterated 

 is not to be found in the official tests laid down in the United States 

 Pharmacopoeia. Since this particular adulterant is not considered 



