XXII REPORT OF THE SECRETARY OF AGRICULTURE. 



PATHOLOGICAL INVESTIGATIONS. 



Investigations of numerous diseases have been in progress. Much 

 work has been done with a view to the discovery of some more effectual 

 method of controlling hog cholera than has yet been devised. Tubercu- 

 losis has been investigated to learn more about the proportion of affected 

 animals which produce infected milk, and to determine whether bovine 

 tuberculosis is communicable to man. Other interesting and impor- 

 tant diseases of horses, cattle, sheep, and poultry have been investigated 

 in order to assist the inspection service in its work or to grant relief 

 in outbreaks to which the attention of the Department has been called. 

 In the treatment and cure of parasitic diseases of sheep and of an 

 eruptive skin disease seriously affecting the heads of these animals, 

 valuable discoveries have been made, which are immediately available 

 for the relief of the sheep industry. Other discoveries as to the nature 

 of several diseases have been made which can not be described at this 

 time. 



STATE RESTRICTIONS ON THE INTERSTATE LrVE-STOCK TRAFFIC. 



Inspection laws and regulations are enforced in a few States, which 

 duplicate the inspection made by the Bureau of Animal Industry of 

 animals which are shipped from one State to another. In addition to 

 the inspection, some of the States demand inspection fees which con- 

 stitute a serious burden on this branch of interstate commerce. This 

 inspection and tax is not confined to cattle which are certified by the 

 Federal inspectors and which are destined for the State making the 

 inspection, but in some cases has been applied to animals simply 

 shipped across the territory of a State and destined for some other 

 section of the country. The enforcement of such a policy is contrary 

 to the interests of the country as a whole, and is a reversion to the 

 system of taxing interstate traffic, which became so vexatious in the 

 period before the adoption of our Constitution. If generally sanc- 

 tioned by the States it would prevent the marketing of live stock from 

 some sections; it would absolutely prohibit shipments across the coun- 

 try, as from Massachusetts to California, and it would destroy much of 

 the usefulness of the Federal inspection and certification, which has 

 become of such value and which has been established by Congress to 

 insure fair treatment and facility of shipment to all sections of the 

 country. So menacing is the present situation to the great cattle 

 industry of the Southwest and West that I have requested the Attorne} T - 

 General of the United States to cooperate in bringing the matter 

 promptly before the Supreme Court for decision as to the constitu- 

 tionality of these State laws. It is a matter for congratulation that 

 this request has been favorably received and that the assistance of the 

 Department of Justice is promised, with a view to obtaining an early 

 adjustment of this serious question. 



