458 ANNUAL rvEPORTS OF DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTUEE. 



take out licenses in increasingly large numbers noAv that certain 

 obstacles have been removed. The State of North Carolina recently 

 has adopted a law providing for a State system of licensed ware- 

 houses, and close cooperation will be maintained between this Bureau 

 and the State officials who direct this work. 



Licenses have been issued to five cotton warehousemen and nine 

 cotton weighers and classifiers during the fiscal year, and applica- 

 tions are on file from 28 additional warehousemen. As soon as 

 the necessary bonds are supplied, licenses will be issued to these 

 applicants. 



Substantial reductions in the cost of insuring licensed warehouses 

 have been secured from rating bureaus in the South. 



Approval of forms of receipts to be used under the regulations 

 has been secured from the Federal Farm Loan Board and steps have 

 been taken to secure like approval from the Federal Reserve Board. 



Proposed regulations for grain warehouses have been issued and 

 public hearings have been held. These regulations are now being 

 prepared in final form and the Department will be ready to consider 

 applications from grain warehousemen in the near future. 



Eegulations for tobacco and wool warehouses are in the course of 

 preparation. 



ENFORCEMENT OF THE STANDARD CONTAINER ACT. 



During the past year the enforcement of the standard container 

 act was supervised by Messrs. W. M. Scott and C. T. More, assisted 

 by Mr. F." P. Downing. 



On account of the cooperation of package manufacturers, the work 

 connected w^ith the enforcement of the United States container act 

 has been largely educational and corrective, one prosecution only 

 having been brought against a manufacturer for violation of this 

 law. In this case the defendant pleaded guilty. Shippers, manu- 

 facturers, the Avholesale trade, and retailers have expressed great 

 satisfaction Avith the results of the operation of this legislation. It 

 has served to remove some of the unnecessary differences in size of 

 packages and simplifies the marketing problem to that extent. Man- 

 ufacturing plants in all parts of the country have been visited and 

 their products have been tested. During the past year particular 

 attention has been given to the packages manufactured in the Rocky 

 Mountain and Pacific Coast States. 



SUPERVISION OF STOCKYARDS AND LIVE-STOCK DEALERS. 



The supervision of licensees operating stockyards or dealing in or 

 handling live stock in or in connection with stockyards, as author- 

 ized by the President's proclamation of June 18, 1918, is conducted 

 by the Bureau of Markets under the direction of the Secretary of 

 Agriculture. Mr. Louis D. Hall is directly in charge of this Avork. 

 A total of 2,803 licenses were in effect at the end of the past fiscal 

 year. General regulations governing licensees were issued July 20, 

 1918, as Circular No. 116 of the office of the Secretary of Agriculture. 

 These regulations were supplemented on September 24, 1918, in 

 accordance with a proclamation of the President dated September 

 6, 1918, which extended the authority to include the live-stock buying 

 activities of packers and the handling of dead stock by rendering 

 concerns. 



A i orps of market su^iervisors was organized as rapidly as prac- 

 ticable and stationed in 20 important live-stock markets. One hun- 



