OLEOMARGARINE. 403 



Mr. DAVIS. I can tell you the name of the trial judge, the judge at 

 Uniontown, Pa. He told the jury that if they believed that was so 

 they should acquit, and they did it. 



Senator DOLLIVER. That would not be conclusive. 



Mr. DAVIS. No; but he said so, and the jury found it as a fact that 

 the coloring in that particular article which was said to be improperly 

 colored was due to the cotton-seed oil in it, and that struck me when I 

 read this bill. You are going to say to the States, " We give up our 

 interstate-commerce regulations so far as this thing is concerned, but 

 you must not prohibit the manufacture and sale of oleomargarine that 

 has not any ingredient in it that will make it look like butter." But 

 the State of Pennsylvania has passed a law, and other States have 

 passed laws, forbidding the manufacture and sale of oleomargarine 

 that has any ingredient in it that makes it look like butter. That is 

 as much as to say that while you forbid prohibition of the one kind you 

 by implication permit the other, and the State may suppress the man- 

 ufacture of oleomargarine into which cotton- seed oil enters. It was 

 entirely new to me. 



Senator DOLLIVER. I do not think that the verdict of that jury 

 should be taken as conclusive upon that point. 



Mr. DAVIS. No; I agree with you about that, because we know there 

 are three things that Providence, it is said, can not foretell, and one of 

 them is the verdict of a jury; but the State chemist so testified under 

 the State's examination in part, and in part under mine. 



Senator DOLLIVER. These cotton-seed oil men, who talked very 

 intelligently to us yesterday, did not seem to have heard of that. 



Mr. DAVIS. Probably they have not heard of it. They do not know 

 all about oleomargarine. 



Mr. SCHELL. It is possible that the cotton- seed oil contained color 

 before it went into the oloemargarine. 



Mr. DAVIS. The chemist testified that he was familiar with the formula 

 of oleomargarine; that he knew about the manufacture and all that 

 sort of thing; that he himself was familiar with the ingredients. When 

 I asked him about the formula according to which it was testified in 

 this case this oleomargarine was made, one of the ingredients being 

 cotton-seed oil, he had to admit that it would give it a yellowish, but- 

 terish color traceable only to the cotton-seed oil. But the point of it is, 

 whether that be true or be not true, you are excepting the prohibition 

 by the States of the manufacture of a certain kind of oleomargarine 

 and leaving it open to them to suppress absolutely the manufacture of 

 any other kind; and that is "neither fish, flesh, nor fowl, nor good red 

 herring." 



Then, furthermore, it is said in support of this bill that this coloring 

 is put in for purposes of fraud. I am not going to take your time by 

 going over the question of the coloring of butter. You have heard ail 

 jibout that until probably you do not want to hear any more; but I 

 1 irotest that oleomargarine is not colored with fraudulent intent. I say 

 that the reason oleomargarine is colored was given by Mr. Wilson, 

 unfortunately now dead, when he was before the House committee. It 

 is because the eye assists the palate in respect to palatability ; and, as 

 he said, the poor man has a right to have his eye tickled by the color 

 of his butter just as well as the rich man; and I call your attention 

 especially to what Professor Wiley, who has been so often misquoted 

 about this matter, has to say on that subject, as reported on pages 190 

 and 191 of the proceedings before the House committee. He is a most 

 intelligent man. I do not know whether he has been before this com- 



