OLEOMARGARINE. 697 



with "Butterine" on it that could be read almost a quarter of a mile 

 away. I interrogated the first man. I said, " How is your business'?' 7 

 He said, "It is good. I think I sell more than any of these butter 

 fellows." "Well," said I, "why do your people buy butterine instead 

 of butter?" Said he, "I will tell you. You see, this butterine is 15 

 cents a pound. They can't buy butter as good as this for less than 30 

 or 35 cents a pound." He said, "Poor people buy this; it suits their 

 taste, and it suits their pocketbook." 



I went to the other stall and asked the dealer," How is your business ! " 

 "Good." Said I, "Who buys from you?" "Well," he said, "a great 

 many poor people; but," he said, "don't you think they are only poor 

 people." He said, "A great many people who are amply able to pay 

 for butter patronize me." "Well," said I, "why do they do that?" 

 "Well," he said, " our product is uniform the year round, and you can't 

 get that in butter. Our product is inspected by the Government, and 

 guaranteed as to its purity; and," he said, " a great many people who 

 want a good article, and a uniform article, all the year round, patron- 

 ize me." 



Gentlemen, all the butter men in the United States can not answer 

 the arguments of those two men. 



You cut off the butterine industry and what are a great many labor- 

 ing men who work for $1 and $1.50 a day and have a big family going 

 to do? It seems that generally the less able a man is to take care of 

 a family the more family surrounds him. Now, take a man with a big 

 family of children, where is he going to get money to pay 30 or 35 cents 

 a pound for butter? Yet these dairymen ask you absolutely to pro- 

 hibit it from his table. 



Now, they come before you and they say that thirty-two States have 

 adopted this butterine law, and that it has not had any effect. They 

 can not stop it. Why is that? Can Congress do any more? Why is 

 it they can not stop it? I will tell you. The world has never yet 

 found anything that it wanted that it did not get in some way. No 

 man can throttle a world's wants. The world lias tried oleomargarine; 

 it has found out that it is nutritious; it is pure; it is just what they 

 want; and all the legislation on earth can not prevent their getting it. 

 You might as well stand on the seashore and bid the incoming waves 

 recede. 



Why, a great many of the States and a great many cities have tried 

 prohibition, but the world likes red liquor, and the result is that prohi- 

 bition has been a failure everywhere it has been tried. Almost all the 

 States of this Union have legislated against the social evil, but the 

 social evil has its attractions, and they have never been able to eradi- 

 cate it. They have succeeded in scattering it, and that is precisely all 

 that can be done. 



Eepresentative NEVILLE. Will you permit me a question right there? 



Mr. ALDREDGE. Yes, sir. 



representative NEVILLE. With reference to the social evil, they do 

 fix it so that a man who does not want it need not take it, do they not? 



Mr. ALDREDGE. Yes, sir; I reckon they do. It is all Greek to me. 

 I don't know anything about it. I will get to that directly, though. 



Now, as Mr. Oliver, representing the North Carolina and South Car- 

 olina oil mills said, we have taught the people how to make one of the 

 finest foods in the world, and if you cut it off in its legitimate tax-pay- 

 ing shape, why, every little farmer in the country will commence mak- 

 ing it. And, as he said, you will have oleomargarine moonshiners 

 galore. You won't have courts enough to try them; you haven't got 



