FIRST REPORT. O 



and by the persons of those employed in taking care of, or even of 

 inspecting the diseased subjects. No remedial agencies have as yet 

 been discovered which would justify for one moment the abandon- 

 ment or neglect of preventive measures. Public policy and private 

 interest alike demand that the pest should, if possible, be stamped out. 



Your committee believe that the introduction of this disease into 

 the State of New York, which contains over two millions of horned 

 beasts and three millions of sheep, with no sanitary regulations estab- 

 lished by law for its suppression, would result, if the ratio of mortality 

 should be equal to that in England, in a loss to the people of this 

 State of at least five millions of dollars. 



Your committee, therefore, recommend that the Society should 

 present a memorial to the Legislature, invoking in behalf of the great 

 interests of the farmers of this State, summary and efficient action by 

 which the disease may be prevented from coming within the borders 

 of the State, and for its extirpation in any locality where it may, by 

 possibility, be introduced ; and to this end have prepared a draft of 

 a bill* to be presented to the Legislature for its approval. 



AN ACT to prevent the introduction and spread of the disease known 

 as the Rinderpest, and for the protection of the flocks and herds of 

 sheep and cattle in this State, from destruction by this and other 

 infectious diseases. 



The People of the State of New York, represented in Senate and Assembly, do enact 

 a^ follows : 



Section 1. It shall be the duty of the health officer of the port of New York, 

 in addition to the duties now imposed on him by existing law, to examine and 

 inquire whether any animals are brought in any vessels arriving at said port in 

 violation of any regulation of law passed by the Congress of the United States 

 prohibiting the importation of such animals. 



§ 2. Whenever any animal is brought as a ship's cow, with no intention of 

 landing the same or of violating any such law or regulation of Congress as afore- 

 said, the same shall be carefully examined and kept in quarantine for the space of 

 at least twenty-one days, and if any symptoms of the infection or incubation of the 

 disease commonly known as the rinderpest, or of any other infectious or contagious 

 disease, shall present themselves, it shall be the duty of the said health officer 



♦The bill prepared by the committee was, at the request of the Society, introduced into the 

 Serate on the Slst day of March, by the Hon. Ezra Cornell, ex-President of the Society, and 

 with slight amendments, became a law, being passed on the 20th of April, three-fifths being 

 present ; a copy of the law^ as passed, being given in the text. 



