92 OLEOMARGARINE. 



dient of oleomargarine is the product of our farms and ranches. Those 

 who produce the ingredients of oleomargarine are just as much entitled 

 to a- fair field and open competition as are those who produce milk and 

 butter. The consumers of the country are entitled to the best that the 

 country affords and at the most reasonable prices that home competi- 

 tion in production can afford. The opposition to oleomargarine is as 

 unreasonable as is that to improved processes of production and to 

 labor-saving machinery. The time has long since passed when the 

 machine must be destroyed because it saves labor and cheapens pro- 

 duction. If American genius can invent some means of producing 

 butter or any other article of consumption which will add to human 

 comfort and happiness, such article is entitled to equal rights before 

 the law with all other articles of like character, even if the old is driven 

 out of the market and the new material entirely supplants it. 



The ACTING CHAIRMAN. Judge, is not that what would happen to 

 the American cow? If she became more valuable for oleomargarine 

 than for butter, would she not be driven out? 



Mr. SPRINGER. Yes, that is possible; but she would go to the 

 slaughterhouse, where she would oe utilized to very great benefit in 

 feeding the hungry people of the world. A gentleman who addressed 

 the committee a few days ago stated that all cows were sent to the 

 block sooner or later. 



The ACTING CHAIRMAN. Then would not the oleomargarine people 

 be required to discover some new method of producing calves? 



Senator HEITFELD. An incubator might be used. 



Mr. SPRINGER. An incubator process might be invented, as sug- 

 gested by the Senator from Idaho. But if the honorable chairman will 

 consult those gentlemen whom I have the honor to represent here, on 

 their ranches upon the vast prairies of the West, he will find that most 

 of the calves which mature into beef cattle are produced by the cows 

 on the ranches which are not used for dairy purposes. 



Senator HEITFELD. Judge, are you not surprised that a farmer from 

 North Dakota does not know that dairy cows are not those that produce 

 the calves that it is the range cows ? 



Mr. SPRINGER. The range cows are those that produce most of them. 

 All calves from dairy cows as a cule are sent to slaughter as soon as 

 they are old enough to be of value as veal. 



The ACTING CHAIRMAN. I supposed it was necessary for a cow to 

 become a calf producer before producing milk. 



Senator HEITFELD. That is true, but most of the dairy calves, per- 

 haps three-fourths of them, go right to the slaughterhouse. 



Mr. SPRINGER. Those that we rely on to produce beeves are raised 

 on ranches, and the cows are not used as milch cows. But, however 

 this may be, I reassert what I stated before, that the law-making 

 power can not interfere with the industries of the country so as to 

 strike one down and build up another merely by reason of the fact 

 that one of them is getting the advantage of the other by adopting 

 improved processes of production so as to cheapen the price of the 

 product to the consumer. That doctrine has long since been exploded, 

 and it never will reappear again, I hope, in this country. If you want 

 to see the fulfillment of the doctrine of repressive legislation to pre- 

 vent improved processes go to China, and you will find a country that 

 regards the machine as the enemy of labor. 



