No. 4.] REPORT OF CATTLE BUREAU. 151 



Chief of the Cattle Bureau is occasionally called, but not 

 often; yet undoubtedly these troubles frequently occur, and 

 may some day become matters of sufficiently serious im- 

 portance to require some legislation or action on the part of 

 the State, to advise and assist farmers in checking losses from 

 these causes. 



Meat Inspection. 



In the tenth semiannual report of the Chief of the Cattle 

 Bureau to your honorable Board, the subject of meat inspec- 

 tion and the laws of this Commonwealth relating to it was 

 dealt with at considerable length. It was again taken up in 

 the twelfth semiannual report, your attention was called to 

 the lax manner in which these laws are enforced by the local 

 authorities, and the baneful influence of local politics upon 

 the inspection of meat was dwelt upon quite fully. At that 

 time the desirability of organizing a State system of slaughter- 

 house licensing and meat inspection, under the supervision of 

 a competent central authority removed from the influence of 

 local politics, and at the expense of the State, was pointed out. 



What was said upon this very important question in the 

 report of January, 1907, and again in January, 1908, seemed 

 to arouse so little comment and awaken so little interest that 

 it was not referred to in the report a year ago. But an agita- 

 tion over the question of a suitable meat supply the last year 

 seems to have suddenly awakened public interest to demand- 

 ing that the law be made adequate and operative, and that the 

 inspection in local slaughterhouses and the sanitary surround- 

 ings be brought up as nearly as possible to the standard re- 

 quired by the United States government in establishments 

 where animals are slaughtered and meat products prepared 

 for export and interstate commerce. There has been so little 

 change in the laws relating to slaughterhouse licensing and 

 meat inspection during the last three years that the criticisms 

 made npon their shortcomings and failure to protect the 

 public health in the tenth and twelfth semiannual reports of 

 the Chief of the Cattle Bureau to the State Board of Agricul- 

 ture apply equally as well to conditions to-day as they did at 

 the time they were written. In fact, conditions have been 



