726 OLEOMAEGAEINE. 



ties. It is a cheap product, and can not stand very heavy freight 

 charges; hence, I think the estimate of two million tons is a large one. 

 1 believe one-third of that is crashed in my own State. 



The use of cotton-seed oil as a food is as old as history itself. Long 

 before the oil was made in the United States by modern methods it was 

 made in all oriental countries and is to day a staple article of food in all 

 the oriental countries. Even in Bible countries it is spoken of. It is 

 spoken of to day as one of the adulterants of olive oil in every single 

 one of the olive-producing countries, and the statement has been made, 

 I do not know how truly, that an absolutely pure olive oil was unat- 

 tainable from the fact that the olive growers in the olive-producing 

 countries are in the habit of starting their oil with cotton seed oil. Even 

 the farmer who makes only a small quantity of cotton oil in the hills of 

 Spain starts his olive oil by pouring cotton seed oil over it. How much 

 of that comes back to us as olive oil I have no means of knowing. 

 The butterine people are amply able to take care of their side of the 

 business of their products. We know that the introduction of cotton 

 oil itself as a cooking fat is one of the possibilities of the future. It is 

 being done, and has been done, in a small way, by nearly all mills, and 

 is used by nearly all the people in their immediate localities. 



The families of nearly all the mill operatives use cotton-seed oil at 

 home. It certainly can not change its nature if put into butterine. 

 Upon the estimate of the crop as just made the sale of cotton seed in 

 the South must add on the average two to three dollars to every bale 

 of cotton marketed in the South. There is a little more than that. It 

 adds the two or three dollars not to the large planter, not to the 

 dealer, but to the small producer. Those of us who are older in the 

 business recollect the time when we were compelled to buy our seed 

 from the small farmers and the negroes, and the large planter consid- 

 ered it as much beneath his dignity to worry about the sale of the cot- 

 ton seed from his cotton as it was to trouble himself about the selling 

 of the eggs and chickens on his place. 



Mr. WILLIAMS. And is not it a rule now with the larger planters 

 that the cotton seed is left to the negroes to sell? 



Mr. ALLISON. It is, to a great extent. 



Mr. WILLIAMS. In the mortgage regulations in the South cotton-seed 

 oil was especially exempted from the mortgages in order that the ten- 

 ant farmer might have the cotton seed with which to pay for his neces- 

 sities. In many cases it was his profit out of the crop. 



Mr. ALLISON. Yes; it is a cash product, for no such thing as a pur- 

 chase of cotton seed on time is known. We do business almost always 

 on credit in the South and cotton seed is the exception to that rule. It 

 is worth so much in cash, that is, between sunup and sundown; 

 because after sundown it is against the law to sell it. It used to be 

 left to the negroes and the smaller farmers, but now it is used a s a 

 medium for small purchases; a load of cottonseed is used as a cash 

 payment for small purchases. They do that because there is no dan- 

 ger of interfering with crop mortgages. We, of course, are not going 

 to pay the price for this cotton seed if we are deprived of those pur- 

 chasers whom this bill would deprive us of. We will take it out of the 

 price of the things we sell. It is the man with the hoe that pays for it, 

 and the manufacturer, of course, would pay that much less for his raw 

 material. While it may be true that we would replace the buyer of this 

 $3,000,000 worth of cotton- seed oil if the butter maker went out of 

 existence, it has a wider significance. We have struggled for years to 

 introduce our product into the European countries, and the largest 



