CHAPTEE IX 



GOVEKNMENTAL WOKK FOE COUNTEY 

 LIFE 



IN state work for the promotion and protection 01 

 agriculture, California has provided broadly and gen- 

 erously for the last forty years. From the first this 

 provision took the form of commissions provided 

 by the legislature with executive authority and appro- 

 priations for each line of productive effort which 

 presented its claims with sufficient force at the capitol. 

 Thus state work for farming was the product of co- 

 operative effort by farmers. The first undertaking 

 in 1880 consisted of a special commission devoted to 

 the promotion of viticulture, followed in 1881 for 

 horticulture, especially for the suppression of insect 

 pests and plant diseases. This work has been liberally 

 and continuously supported ever since and developed 

 into an effective system for the exclusion of trees 

 and plants from states and countries infested by 

 pests until protective policies long prevailing in Cali- 

 fornia developed into a national exclusion act in 1919. 



The State has also enacted laws by which the poli- 

 cies of its general executive commissions could be 

 locally applied through the appointment by the su- 

 pervisors of county commissioners to enforce ordi- 

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