695 
The most recent legislation by Congress relating to the sale of 
milk in the District was enacted on February 27, 1907, under the 
title, “An act to amend section eight hundred and seventy-eight of 
the Code of Law for the District of Columbia/’ 0 The purpose 
of the amendment was to extend to dairymen the right enjoyed by 
dealers in other beverages, to register with the clerk of the supreme 
court of the District of Columbia distinctive marks for the identifi- 
cation of the vessels in which deliveries are made, and thus to secure 
exclusive right to the use of such vessels, under pain of fine or im- 
prisonment imposed on any person trespassing against such right. * 6 
Xeither the Federal Department of Agriculture nor the health 
department of the District has as yet undertaken to apply to the con- 
trol of the local milk supply the act officially designated as the food 
and drugs act, June 30, 1906, and commonly known as “ the pure 
food act.’ v WTiat the effect of its application will be remains, there- 
fore, to be determined. 
The results of the extensive investigations recently made by the 
Federal Department of Agriculture into the condition of the dairy 
farms and dairies supplying milk to the District, and of the milk sold 
here, have not yet been officially published. The results of the work 
done by the Public Health and Marine-Hosiptal Service during the 
summer of 1906, in connection with its investigation into the cause of 
the undue prevalence of typhoid fever, appear at length in one of the. 
recent bulletins published by that service.* 1 All that is of general 
interest of the report of the conference called by the Commissioners 
of the District on March 30, 1907, to determine what should be done 
to improve the milk supply has been printed in certain circulars 
lately issued by the Department of Agriculture/ As valuable as this 
work has been, yet in view of what has already been published con- 
cerning it, and in view of the probable issue of further bulletins relat- 
ing thereto, all of which are or will be available to those interested in 
the subject, it does not seem expedient to give any detailed account 
of it here. 
It could not be expected that with any reasonably rigid enforce- 
ment of the laws and regulations relating to the production and sale 
of milk, and the manufacture and sale of foods generally, over any 
considerable period, questions of construction would not arise and be 
submitted to the courts for adjudication. The first case that seems to 
o34 Stats., 1006. 
6 See page 740 for full text of this law. 
c 34 Stats., 768. 
d Public Health and Marine-Hospital Service, Hygienic Laboratory. Bulletin 
No. 35. February, 1907. 
e Bureau of Animal Industry, Circular 111, issued June 22, 1907. Circular 
114, issued August 20, 1907. 
