OLEOMARGARINE. 703 



that it was unwholesome, and consequently its manufacture and sale 

 should be prohibited. This argument, false in its inception, is now 

 considered crude, and is never used by intelligent detainers of the 

 article. Unfortunately, however, a misguided and overzealous orator 

 is occasionally found who, in his anxiety to make a damaging state- 

 ment, will so far forget himself as to reflect upon its purity and whole- 

 someness. People of this class are generally opposed to advanced ideas 

 along any line, and continue their harangue against improvements of 

 all kinds until they are caught and crushed beneath the wheels of 

 progress, and their funeral is usually small. 



It is a well established fact that the methods employed in the manu- 

 facture of oleomargarine are of a scientific nature; that the buildings 

 and appurtenances are of modern kind and latest improvement, insur- 

 ing perfect sanitation and ventilation, as well as absolute cleanliness 

 in every department. Of the product itself, Jollies and Winckler, 

 official chemists of the Austrian Government, after a searching investi- 

 gation, report that the only germs ever present in oleomargarine are 

 those common to air and water. Although carefully sought for, tuber- 

 cular bacilli and other obnoxious bacilli were conspicuously absent, 

 and to-day there is no recognized scientific authority in this country 

 or any other that does not indorse oleomargarine as a healthful food 

 product. 



We have heretofore refrained from attacking butter and the methods 

 of its manufacture, but Mr. Edward Chadwick, manager of a large cream- 

 ery at Osgood, Iowa, in a letter to his patrons, which was published in 

 the columns of the Chicago Dairy Produce, the official organ of the 

 dairy people, says : 



A good deal of milk is brought in dirty, because not strained at home, and no 

 effort made to keep straws or tilth out of it. Some of the cans are seldom or never 

 properly washed, and a thick coating of sticky filth may be scraped off them, both 

 inside and out. I can strain the milk, run it through the separator, and remove a 

 large part of the dirt, but no butter maker on earth can remove the tainted and filthy 

 smell that milk gets from staying in unclean cans in bad-smelling barns. Some of 

 our patrons would be horrified if they saw the dirt and filth I remove from my 

 strainer and separator. Does anybody think that a bar of soap, a chunk of stable 

 manure, potatoes, parsnips, dish rags, or hairpins soaking in your cans overnight 

 or longer will improve the flavor of the milk? I have found all of the above and 

 more in the strainer of the weigh can. How can good butter be made from such 

 milk? When you send your jar to the creamery for butter for your own use, what 

 would you say if I should put some of the dirt I find in your milk on top of the 

 butter in your jar? You would return that butter to the creamery, and be mad 

 besides. If the butter maker would return your dirty milk to your home he would 

 be doing his duty, although it would make you mad. 



In addition to the above, recent experiments in Chicago have dem- 

 onstrated the fact that a large percentage of the dairy herds of the 

 Northwest are infected with tuberculosis. The deadly character of 

 these germs is only too well known, and the introduction of them into 

 the human system through the use of contaminated milk or butter is 

 conceded by every recognized authority. 



This, gentlemen, is a fair comparison of the advantages and disad- 

 vantages under which the two products are manufactured. Now the 

 contention is advanced by the parties interested in the passage of this 

 bill that they do not want oleomargarine colored in imitation of natural 

 butter, and I want to say most emphatically to the members of this 

 committee that oleomargarine is not colored to represent natural but- 

 ter, and further, that, practically speaking, no such thing as natural 

 butter is offered for sale in any market. It is all artificially colored, 

 and further, that if not artificially colored six months out of the year 

 it could not be sold other than at a sacrifice. Why are these people 



