SALE OF FOOD AND DRUGS ACTS. 29 



enforced, and prosecutions may be brought under section 6 which 

 might have been unsuccessful if brought under sections 3 and 4. In 

 the administration of section 6 one phase of judicial construction is 

 particularly interesting because it shows the difference in the method 

 of handling cases in Great Britain and in the United States. In 

 Great Britain " a purchaser can not be prejudiced when notice is given 

 to him at the time of the sale that an article sold is not of the nature, 

 substance, and quality of the article he demands." In the United 

 States it is required that the label give proper notice; that is, if a prod- 

 uct is labeled, it must carry truthful statements on it. There is, in 

 general, no legal requirement for placing a label on a food, and in the 

 case of drugs, only limited requirements. It is possible, however, 

 for a food to be both adulterated and misbranded although bearing no 

 label. The Secretary of the Treasury, the Secretary of Agriculture, 

 and the Secretary of Commerce and Labor, in Regulation 22 of the 

 Rules and Regulations for the Enforcement of the Food and Drugs 

 Act (Circular No. 21, revised), state that 



It is prohibited to sell or offer for sale a food or drug product bearing no label upon 

 the package or no descriptive matter whatever connected with it, either by design, 

 device, or otherwise, if said product be an imitation of or offered for sale under the 

 name of another article. 



There are, under section 6 of the sale of food and drugs act, four 

 provisos which give exemption from its terms. Subsection 2 excludes 

 proprietary 7 medicines from the consideration of the law. Subsection 

 3 of section 6 is inoperative because the law is silent as to how drugs 

 are to be compounded. 



No standards are written into many of our State laws nor into 

 the Federal law, and the same is practically true of the sale of food 

 and drugs act 1 and it is necessary in consequence to determine in 

 each specific case whether the article is in violation of section 6. 

 The British Pharmacopoeia is generally made use of in connection 

 with the enforcement of the law, and though it is not conclusive, 

 very strong evidence is necessary to displace it. 



Subsection 4 of section 6 leaves it to be determined in each instance 

 by evidence whether or not a food or drug has been unavoidably 

 mixed with extraneous matter in the process of collection or prepa- 

 ration. This must be necessarily so in the absence of standards, 

 and there is a complete parallel in the food and drugs act of the 

 United States. While Circular 19 of the Office of the Secretary of 

 Agriculture may serve as a guide in determining whether, for example, 

 cayenne pepper has an undue amount of sand or dirt ground with 

 it, yet it must be determined by the courts whether or not the amount 

 found constitutes an adulteration. 



1 There are a few exceptions in the sale of food and drugs acts, as water in spirits (1879 act, sec. 6); 

 water in butter and margarine (butter and margarine act, 1907), etc. 



