73 g UNITED STATES HISTORY 



employers who refuse to adopt it. Federal legislation is notably increasing in volume. 

 In 1912 the manufacture of poisonous' phosphorus matches was prohibited (April 9) 

 by an exercise of the taxing power; a commission established to examine into the 

 relations between capital and labour; and the scope of the eight-hour and accident com- 

 pensation laws applying to government employees enlarged. The welfare of wage- 

 earners received unusual attention in the presidential campaign on account of the 

 position accorded it in the platform of the Progressive party. 



The sentiment against intemperance has been growing rapidly in the United States. 

 A systematic agitation has given wide publicity to the economic waste and the social 

 evils which it entails. At this time, by state or local action, the sale of 

 The liquor is prohibited in two-thirds of the whole country and among nearly 



movement. na M of the population. That the prohibition movement made no great 

 progress and suffered no reverses in 1912 may be set down to the fact that 

 it was a presidential year, and that the people were occupied with other questions, as 

 may be seen from the losses of the Prohibition party in the 1912 campaign, partly to the 

 Progressives. In New York the members of the legislature, fearing to compromise 

 themselves, made no concessions either to the liquor interests or to their opponents. 

 In the November elections, however, the state of West Virginia went " dry " by a 

 large majority (92,342). It is also worthy of mention that several railroads in Pennsyl- 

 vania, urged by the anti-saloon league of that state, discontinued serving drinks on 

 their dining cars; that in Illinois (q.v.) certain railways did the same thing because of 

 local prohibition; and that the Southern Pacific Railroad began the construction of 

 recreation houses along its lines with the idea of keeping its employees away from the 

 saloons. The new movement in politics which looks to the elimination of the boss 

 and his corrupt affiliations will help the prohibition cause. Hitherto the control which 

 the bosses have exercised over the government, and the liquor men over the bosses, has 

 resulted in a general defiance of the law and a popular saying that " prohibition does 

 not prohibit." It is also true that under Federal law liquor may be shipped from" wet" 

 states into " dry " states and that the state authority may assume jurisdiction over 

 it only when the original package (see E. B. xx, 273) has been broken or its contents 

 have left the hands of the consignee. In February 1913 a bill to do away with this 

 immunity was vetoed by President Taft. 



Health laws are another phase of conservation. Not only have the states been 

 seriously backward in legislation, but enforcement has been still more lax. Unfortu- 

 nately the great hope which was placed in the Federal Pure Food and Drugs 

 /3 /' e h/; n ac ^ ^ I00 ^ nas no ^ b een altogether realised. By a decision of the Supreme 

 health. Court, May 29, 1911 (U.S. v. Johnson), it was held that extravagant claims 



might be made for worthless patent medicines without any contravention 

 of the act. Apparently the Secretary of Agriculture was not in sympathy with its 

 strict enforcement. The intrigues against Dr. H. W. Wiley, 1 chief of the bureau of 

 chemistry, attracted public attention in 1911. When he resigned (March 15, 1912), 

 he announced that conditions in the department made it impossible for him to remain. 

 There was a general feeling that the President should have intervened to eliminate the 

 influences which drove Dr. Wiley out. 



1 Harvey Washington Wiley was born in Kent, Indiana, in 1844; graduated at Hanover 

 College in 1867, Indiana Medical College in 1871 and Harvard in 1873. He taught Latin 

 and Greek in Butler College, Indianapolis, in 1868-70; from 1874 to 1883 was state chemist 

 of Indiana and professor of chemistry in Purdue University; and from 1883 to 1912 was chief 

 chemist of the U. S. Department of Agriculture. His opposition to the use of benzoate of 

 soda as a food preservative aroused the hostility of certain food packers, and a chemistry 

 board (of experts) was appointed which disagreed with him in regard to the injurious effects 

 of this preservative. On July 13, 191 1, the Attorney-General recommended Wiley's dismissal 

 on the ground that he had employed at a rate higher than the legal per diem a consulting 

 expert, H. H. Rusby. President Taft sustained Dr. Wiley in a letter of Sept. 15, 1911. An 

 impression prevailed that the incident was the outgrowth of a personal quarrel between Dr. 

 Wiley and G. P. McCabe, solicitor and member of the personnel board of the Dept. Dr. 

 Wiley was succeeded in December 1912 by Dr. Carl L. Alsberg. 



