Dairying and Machine Politics 



A GREAT NATION owes it to its 

 people to protect and promote 

 its health. The most proper 

 function of government is to guard 

 the food supply of its people, to estab- 

 lish standards of product, to insist 

 that sanitary conditions surround the 

 production, handling and distribution 

 of food. 



The Dairy Industry, itself a sufferer 

 from substitution, placed upon the 

 statute books the laws dealing with 

 oleomargarine. It heartily concurs 

 with National, State and Municipal 

 governments in their efforts to raise the 

 standard, safety and cleanliness of food. 



The Council stands pledged to support 

 every progressive measure in the inter- 

 est of the public health. It earnestly 

 desires to co-operate with officials every- 

 where in just regulation and progressive 

 improvement of the Dairy Industry. 



Nothing will more quickly advance 

 prompt and cheerful compliance with 

 laws and ordinances than the belief 

 in their justice, their practicability and 

 their universal application. 



Therefore, we advocate a single national 

 standard for Dairy Products by which 

 the many different and conflicting laws, 

 rules and regulations under which we 

 are now compelled to operate may be 

 standardized and given universal appli- 

 cation and uniform interpretation. 



State and Municipal governments 

 change rapidly. Each new State Legis- 

 lature changes existing laws and adds 

 new ones. Each new State Official 

 places a different interpretation on the 

 multiplicity of laws and imposes new 



requirements and additional unneces- 

 sary hardships. 



The barn or the milk house which was 

 approved yesterday is condemned 

 tomorrow; the profit of the producer 

 is wiped out; he becomes discouraged 

 and quits dairying as a forlorn hope. 

 Every dairyman thus lost to us means a 

 loss to the industry; a delay in its 

 advancement, a blow to agriculture, 

 to soil fertility, a loss of national wealth 

 and therefore a personal loss to every 

 citizen. 



The protest of the individual dairyman 

 falls upon deaf ears. The purely local 

 association, or the purely class associa- 

 tion, representing but a small part of 

 our billion dollar industry, does not 

 exert the influence and the power of a 

 highly organized NATIONAL alliance 

 which can enforce respect for its just 

 claims in the very highest places. 



In his famous book, "The Milk Ques- 

 tion," Professor M. J. Rosenau, of 

 Harvard, says: 



"The introduction of the milk question 

 into politics is not an unmixed evil. The 

 sanitarian has long fought against the 

 mischievous influence of machine politics 

 in the administration of health matters. 

 Health boards have too long been made 

 the football of politics. Real progress can- 

 not be had until the health ofifice is divorced 

 from the political influences as they exist 

 in many of our cities and states today. 



We welcome the milk problem in politics — 

 so far as that may be necessary to obtain 

 legislation; but we must insist that the 

 administration of the laws must be strictly 



non-partisan." 



