252 OLEOMARGARINE. 



Mr. KAUFFMAN. I want to answer Judge Springer's question. We 

 misapprehended each other a little, I think. My friend Springer says 

 that we are getting better prices for butter every year. Now, I will 

 say that we are getting better prices in the Philadelphia produce mar- 

 ket to-day than we did two years ago. But prior to those two years, 

 for three years before, the trend of the butter market was downward, 

 because of competition from the illegal sales of oleo. The reason we 

 are getting better prices to-day is because of the work of this associa- 

 tion in enforcing the law. 



Mr. SPRINGER. We want to help you enforce the law. 



Mr. MILLER. Mr. Kaufman, I would like to say just one thing. I 

 can say this: I will give my oath to-day that the cheapest grade of 

 butterine we manufacture costs a great deal over 8 cents. 



Mr. KAUFFMAN. It will not cost you 10 cents. 



Mr. MILLER. 1 am not saying what it costs. I say it costs a good 

 deal over 8 cents. [Laughter.] 



Mr. EDSON. Mr. Kauffman, there is one thing I would like to cor- 

 rect before you sit down. 



Mr. KAUFFMAN. What is that? 



Mr. EDSON. You stated that the price of butter was so much better 

 than it was two years ago. Now, I will tell you, from a business 

 man's standpoint, and from the standpoint of one who does a pretty 

 good business in Philadelphia in the butter line, that the butter busi- 

 ness in Philadelphia or in Pennsylvania shows its sensitiveness to the 

 oleomargarine law, inasmuch as that the moment we began to prose- 

 cute the law and punish the offenders the volume of our business 

 increased. During the last year, with these prosecutions under way, 

 there is not a butter man in Philadelphia whose volume of business 

 has not very largely increased, so that that will account for a much 

 larger output of butter in the State of Pennsylvania. 



Now, answering the Judge's question in regard to the increase of 

 the butter business in the United States yearly, 1 would state for his 

 information that we are exporting large amounts of butter out of this 

 country every year, and our export trade is growing at the expense 

 of a good deal of our consumptive trade right here in this country, 

 owing to the competition of oleomargarine. 



Mr. SCHELL. Now, Mr. Chairman, if I have the floor, Mr. Kauffman 

 has answered my question at length, and I want to see if I received 

 the right impression. You and your clients are not opposed to a law 

 which would so regulate the sale of colored oleomargarine that con- 

 viction would practically be certain? 



Mr. KAUFFMAN. No. 



Mr. SCHELL (continuing). If a man sold oleomargarine for butter? 



Mr. KAUFFMAN. No. 



Mr. SCHELL. You are willing that colored oleomargarine should 

 be sold ? 



Mr. KAUFFMAN. Provided 



Mr. SCHELL. But it must be sold for oleomargarine? 



Mr. KAUFFMAN. Oh, yes. 



Mr. SCHELL. And not for butter? 



Mr. KAUFFMAN. Provided we insist that a part of that regulation 

 shall be the imposition of this 10-cent tax, because oleomargarine can 

 be produced at so much less that it can absolutely undersell and drive 

 out of the market the production of butter. 



