OLEOMAEGAEINE. 233 



no objection to oleomargarine and would probably sell it to-morrow 

 if I could sell it according to the laws, and if the people to whom 1 

 sold it would comply with the laws so as not to get me in a position 

 like they did a few years ago. If a retailer was caught violating the 

 laws of Pennsylvania he would take advantage of the laws and simply 

 say, "Well, I can not pay you, because you are in an illicit business," 

 and he would give that as a reason for not paying his bills. The traffic 

 is in a very serious condition. As I have said before, I have no seri- 

 ous objection to the sale of oleomargarine as oleomargarine; but the 

 trade to which we sell can not compete with the men who are willing 

 to take the chances of arrest for violating the present State and national 

 laws. 



I hope, therefore, that the bill will pass because it will relieve, in a 

 great measure, the present expensive system of enforcing the national 

 as well as the State law. The States know that they can not control 

 the sale of this product without the use of a great deal of money, and 

 it is impossible to watch the thousand and one small dealers. A great 

 many of them are unlicensed. There are in the city of Philadelphia 

 and in the State of Pennsylvania a great many unlicensed dealers. 

 The revenue men are not able to find illicit dealers sufficient even to 

 collect the revenue. One revenue collector himself told me that he 

 went to Pittsburg and in a few days found 35 illicit oleo dealers who 

 had not paid the Government tax at all, and were violating both the 

 national and State laws. 



Mr. SPRINGER. Mr. Jamison, let me ask you a question, please. 

 You are a commission merchant? 



Mr. JAMISON. Yes. 



Mr. SPRINGER. Could you not devise a law which would so identify, 

 at the factory, manufacturers of oleomargarine, that it could be car- 

 ried in that condition to the consumer without any risk of coming into 

 competition with creamery butter? ; - 



Mr. JAMISON. I know of no way of accomplishing that result. * I 

 have given it serious thought. We supplied the best hotels at one 

 time. We sell butter to hotels from Maine to Florida. We supplied 

 this town here for }^ears with probably 90 per cent of the fine butter 

 used here. And I do not see how, after the goods leave the factory, 

 they can reach the hotel, the restaurant, the boarding house, or the 

 retailer, and not be used as butter. The retailer can take a machine, 

 and no matter how you brand it, even if you put something in the 

 interior of the butter, he .can take it out and print it over and sell 

 it for butter. 



Mr. SPRINGER. If the law required the retail dealer to sell it to the 

 consumer in the original package, without the paper being broken, 

 would it not then reach the consumer as it came from the factory, in 

 the original package? 



Mr. JAMISON. The national law requires to-day that every package 

 of oleo sold at retail must be marked with the word " oleomargarine," 

 the address, and the number of pounds. Every retailer in Philadel- 

 phia, you may say, violates that law to-day. 



Mr. SPRINGER. But if they were required by the law to sell it in the 

 original package, without breaking the seal or the internal-revenue 

 stamp, and deliver it in that shape to the consumer, would you see any 

 danger then from its coming in competition with the sale of creamery 



