OLEOMARGARINE. 81 



As I do not desire to repeat any of the statements which have been 

 made before the House committee, as this committee has the printed 

 hearings before it, I will only call attention to some of the remarks 

 before the House committee. 



There is one point, however, to which I desire to call the attention 

 of the committee, and that is the unanimity with which all those who 

 oppose the passage of the pending bill declare that its passage will 

 destroy the oleomargarine industry in the United States. The testi- 

 mony on this point is so clear and emphatic that there can scarcely be 

 any doubt of the fact. The persons who have testified upon this point 

 are engaged in the business or have thoroughly investigated it. They 

 know whereof they speak, and Congress ought to give their testimony 

 the most serious consideration. 



But the friends of the bill declare their purpose to destroy the indus- 

 try. They have framed the bill with that end in view, and having the 

 framing of it with that end in view, they ought to have been able to so 

 express themselves as to carry out their purpose. 



I call attention to a portion of the minorit}^ report of th< Committee 

 on Agriculture of the House, which is before you, in which Mr. 

 Adams, the pure-food commissioner of the State of Wisconsin, in his 

 testimony before the committee, March 7, 1900, said: 



4 ' There is no use beating about the bush in this matter. We want 

 to pass this law and drive the oleomargarine manufacturers out of the 

 business." 



Mr. ADAMS. Mr. Chairman 



Mr. SPRINGER. Mr. Adams is here and can state for himself. 



Mr. ADAMS. Will the gentleman allow me ? 



Mr. SPRINGER. Certainly. 



Mr. ADAMS. I think it is proper at this time to state that the state- 

 ment in the report of the minority as quoted, and properly read by the 

 gentleman, is absolutely and unqualifiedly false. I made no such state- 

 ment. There was no stenographer present at that hearing. I have 

 never had any such idea. I simply stated that our purpose was to stop 

 the fraud in the sale of colored oleomargarine and nothing more; that 

 we had no purpose to stop the manufacture and sale of oleomargarine, 

 but simply of the colored imitation counterfeit product. 



Mr. SPRINGER. I so understood the gentleman. There is no other 

 kind of oleomargarine made except colored oleomargarine. 



Senator HEITFELD. Judge, did you quote from the report of the 

 minority ? 



Mr. SPRINGER. Yes, sir; it is a part of their proceedings I was quot- 

 ing, and that has been put before the committee by Mr. Grout. I 

 assumed it was correct or I should not have referred to it. But I have 

 in my hand a newspaper entitled ''Hoard's Dairyman," a recent pub- 

 lication, in which there is an extract from an address of Mr. Adams, 

 who has just spoken to the committee, before the Wisconsin Dairy- 

 men's Association, in which I find this statement: 



' ; Now, why do we want this tax ? I will tell you why. Because 

 oleomargarine, which is colored in imitation of }^ellow butter, is a 

 counterfeit, which the average purchaser can not detect, and it is placed 

 upon the tables of the people and consumed by men and women who 

 ask for butter and think they are getting it, and we want to put a tax 

 upon the article so high that they can not place it upon the markets of 

 this country in imitation of butter." 



S. Rep. 2043 6 



