QUARANTINE LAWS AND ORDERS. 



QUARANTINE ORDERS. 



The State Horticultural Commission Act (Political Code, chapter 

 600) authorizes the Commissioner, with the approval of the Governor, 

 to establish quarantine districts and lines, and to make regulations, all 

 for the protection of the orchard and farm products of the State. In 

 pursuance of this authority and without attempting to particularly 

 interpret the law under consideration, this Act seems to the writer to 

 separate the quarantine practice into two divisions. 



Where the action establishes permanent quarantine lines or districts 

 and which restrict or otherwise affect public rights the provisions 

 plainly require the Governor's approval; where the quarantine is 

 invoked to hold up and control a shipment or any article incidentally 

 and does not involve the freedom of the public, the quarantine officers 

 may handle the case by merely serving a quarantine notice upon the 

 party in charge of the article to be detained. As the state quarantine 

 guardians will have to do with the latter class of work only, the admin- 

 istration of the law is simpler, and they are thus authorized to proceed 

 upon their own initiative to detain and handle contraband cases with- 

 out the approval of other authorities. It was the intention of the 

 framers of this act to provide legal machinery for emergency cases, and 

 at the same time restrict arbitrary, permanent action that might deal 

 unjustly with the public. The right to quarantine an infected article 

 of horticulture is a police power conferred by this statute. Its 

 efficiency often depends upon the authority to act promptly. The 

 Supreme Court has sustained this principle in holding that a horticul- 

 tural quarantine law is constitutional, and that it must be made prompt 

 and summary to be effective. It is plainly the intent of the law to give 

 quarantine officers authority to act summarily in all emergency cases, 

 observing the requirements of the act and abating or removing the dan- 

 ger as set forth and authorized by the Horticultural Quarantine law of 

 1899. 



Below will be found a list of six quarantine orders issued by the 

 State Commissioner, approved by the Governor, and all but one involv- 

 ing the idea of a permanent territorial quarantine, as indicated in the 

 first division of quarantine practice referred to in the preceding para- 

 graph. All these orders, excepting No. 5, are in force at this writing : 



List of Quarantine Orders. 



Number. Subject. Date issued. 



Order No. 1__ __Citrus White Fly __October 3, 1905 



Order No. 2 Cotton Boll Weevil April 23, 1903 



Order No. 3 Scale Insects January 17, 1910 



Order No. 4 Cucumber Maggot March 28, 1910 



Order No. 5 Eel Worm Quarantine January 6, 1911 



Order No. 6 Mediterranean Fruit Fly June 24, 1911 



CITRUS WHITE FLY. 



The first order of quarantine issued under the authority of the act 

 of 1903 related to the inhibition of Florida plants, etc. This order has 

 been amended several times, and it is thought best to give it as it 



