664 OLEOMARGARINE. 



to the damage and loss of various other producing classes, and at the 

 expense of a very large class of worthy consuming citizens of moderate 

 means. We doubt if there ever has been any producers of genuine, 

 high-grade, gilt-edged butter who have been spending their time and 

 money trying to pass such unjust class laws. It is only the producers 

 of low-grade butter, who find their wares shelved or required to be sold 

 at less price than oleomargarine, who are always agitating the subject 

 of taxing oleomargarine to make its sale prohibitory. We firmly believe 

 that there is now produced by the small country butter makers large 

 quantities of adulterated butter or oleomargarine, which, under the 

 present law, enacted years ago, should pay a tax of 2 cents per pound 

 and be subject to all the vexatious sale regulations that are now on the 

 statute books, but which goes scot free, simply because the butter is 

 offered by a so-called " guileless farmer." 



Any farmer keeping half a dozen or more cows for butter making can 

 run his own little oleomargarine factory by mixing neutral lard oil, 

 cotton-seed oil, oleo oil, etc., in bis churn with cream or milk, thereby 

 producing an inferior oleomargarine, which he sells as "homemade," 

 "pure country butter," without tax or restriction; and it is this class 

 of dairymen and producers of dirty, unscientifically made "pure but- 

 ter" that are asking for a tax and sale restrictions on the products of 

 the large manufacturers of oleomargarine who are now paying the unjust 

 2 cents per pound tax and submitting to all the vexatious regulations 

 necessary to sell same. No manufacturer of "Philadelphia print" or 

 "Elgin creamery" grades of butter is asking for a tax on oleomar- 

 garine. Why should " genuine butter," so called, be allowed a monoply 

 to use the butter coloring article of commerce, "annotto," that has been 

 for about thirty years, or ever since oleomargarine was invented, one 

 of the ingredients in its manufacture? There is no question or doubt 

 bt what the present artificial butter coloring was used in the first 

 oleomargarine placed on the market, and has always been so used ; also, 

 that its use in so-called "genuine butter" has been brought about by 

 the impossibility of " genuine butter" when uncolored to compete with 

 the oleomargarine of commerce, that has always the same color because 

 it has always used the artificial coloring agency. If a monopoly of 

 artificial coloring should be enjoyed by anyone it should be the oleo- 

 margarine manufacturers, not the cow butter makers. 



If it was possible to educate the small producers of butter and thereby 

 make their production of "genuine butter" equal in quality to the 

 product of the best dairymen and creameries, there would be a ready 

 market for it all at about the present price for the very best grades of 

 cow butter, in which case oleomargarine would sell for several cents 

 less per pound and be used almost exclusively by those consumers with 

 limited means who are willing to use an article that is sold at less 

 money and which suits them about as well as a higher-priced article; 

 but it is not possible to so educate the mass of dairymen, and as long 

 as the large proportion of the dairymen abuse their production by 

 making bad butter, just so long will the oleomargarine find favor with 

 the consumers with limited means, for it is recognized by all as being 

 far superior as an article of food to at least half if not two-thirds of 

 the butter, genuine and artificial, produced by the farmers and others. 

 Legislative enactments should be for the benefit of all, not for a favored 

 class. The enactment of any one of the proposed 10 cents per pound 

 tax or anticoloring bills will prohibit the manufacture of oleomarga- 

 rine openly and aboveboard but will not prevent its being carried on 

 by an increased number of farmers and moonshine manufacturers in 

 defiance of the laws and without paying taxes. 



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