PREFACE. 



The first edition of this work, published in 1908, supplied a need 

 for a convenient compend of the law affecting the Department of 

 Agriculture. Until its publication the laws applicable to this depart- 

 ment had not been brought together. To ascertain the law on any 

 subject affecting the department necessitated a search through the 

 Revised Statutes, the Supplements thereto, and the Statutes at Large. 

 The former edition of this work embraced all legislation in effect on 

 July 1, 1907, or to and including the Fifty-ninth Congress. That 

 edition is now obsolete in many respects by reason of subsequent 

 enactments by Congress, including new legislation or provisions 

 repealing or superseding earlier provisions. 



The present compilation collects and presents all laws affecting the 

 Department of Agriculture, permanent or not clearly temporary in 

 their nature, in force on August 27, 1912, including the enactments 

 of the second session of the Sixty-second Congress. The work repre- 

 sents the results of a carefid and painstaking examination of the 

 Revised Statutes, the Supplements thereto, and the Statutes at 

 Large. Provisions in various acts and riders in agricultural and 

 other appropriation acts have been extracted and preserved. The 

 work embraces not only provisions of law relating specifically to the 

 Department of Agriculture and its various branches, officers, etc., 

 but also all provisions relating to the public service in general and 

 incidentally affecting, or applicable to, the Department of Agricul- 

 ture. It was deemed convenient to classify the subject matter on 

 this general basis^, notwithstanding the fact that many sections of the 

 work relating to the public service in general, and affecting the 

 Department of Agriculture incidentally, treat of the same subject 

 matter as sections of the work relating specifically to the department. 

 The provisions of law are arranged according to subject matter 

 under appropriate general headings. The classification of the sub- 

 ject matter, owing to its heterogeneous character, is necessarily arbi- 

 trary in many instances. Provisions related in subject matter have 

 been placed in juxtaposition without regard to time or order of 

 enactment. Acts and parts of acts deemed inapplicable to the De- 

 partment of Agriculture, or which have expired or have been repealed, 

 or for which substitutes in express terms are provided, are omitted, 



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