750 OLEOMARGARINE. 



margarine. You understand that there is a bill pending before Con- 

 gress to raise the tax on colored oleomargarine to 10 cents a pound, do 

 you not? 



Commissioner WILSON. Yes, sir. 



Representative BAILEY. What would be the effect of that bill, in 

 your opinion, Mr. Wilson, in regard to the collection of revenue? 



Commissioner WILSON. It is pretty hard for me to foreshadow what 

 would be the result of forcing the sale of white or uncolored oleomar- 

 garine. I should regard the tax of 10 cents a pound on colored oleo- 

 margarine as prohibitive. I do not think the manufacturers can do 

 much with it with a tax of that amount. I think the bill would defeat 

 the end of deriving any revenue from the sale of colored oleomargarine. 

 1 think that would be largely the result of its passage. 



Representative BAILEY. Do you consider the present laws regard- 

 ing the manufacture of oleomargarine sufficient to prevent its fraudu- 

 lent use? 



Commissioner WILSON. With a very slight change in the law, yes, 

 sir almost absolutely so. 



Kepresentative WILLIAMS. What change would you recommend! 



Commissioner WILSON. I would recommend a change which would 

 require the manufacturer to put up statutory packages in subpackages, 

 to meet the lowest demand of the retail trade and the highest demand 

 of the wholesale trade, upon each of which subpackages should be 

 impressed, in such a way that it could not be obscured or obliterated 

 without manifest effort and intention, the word " oleomargarine." 



Representative ALLEN. I would like to ask you, Mr. Wilson, what is 

 your knowledge of the efficiency of the service in executing the law 

 with reference to dealers in colored oleomargarine, especially retail 

 dealers? I have been told that your representative in the city of 

 Chicago is either indifferent, negligent, or possibly particeps criminis to 

 the evasion of the law. 



Commissioner WILSON. I think that is an unjust charge. I would 

 prefer that Collector Cohen should come before the committee and 

 defend himself. He is a good collector. There is this to be said gen- 

 erally upon the whole subject, gentlemen: The manufacture of oleo- 

 margarine in this country reaches 80,000,000 of pounds annually, and 

 the product is distributed to possibly half of the people of this conn try; 

 and when you come down to handing it out to those people in quantities 

 of from half a pound to 5 pounds at a time, you necessarily have, in a 

 year, a great many transactions; and it is utterly impossible, with the 

 means placed in the hands of the Internal Revenue Bureau, to place 

 such a close espionage upon these little transactions as to prevent any 

 misrepresentations with reference to the sale of oleomargarine as butter. 

 We give more attention and spend more money on that subject than we 

 do upon anything else, although the ad valorem tax upon the product, 

 as compared to other things, is very low. 



The incentive which brings about this violation of the law is not lim- 

 ited, in my judgment, simply to the desire for gain upon the part of the 

 retail dealer who is selling oleomargarine. There are other sides to the 

 question. The private family, the boarding-house proprietor, the hotel 

 proprietor, do not want to carry home oleomargarine marked as such. 

 We encounter a great deal of that feeling. The dealer has paid his 

 special tax; he has no object in evading the law, but he sells oleomar- 

 garine without any mark on it. Although the person who buys it 

 understands that it is oleomargarine, the dealer has violated section 6 

 of the law by not putting any mark on it, or else by putting it on in such 



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