62 
E. P. NILES. 
once thrust itself upon our legislators. The two professions 
combined will carry with them much more powerful influence 
than we can hope to carry alone, especially while our numbers 
are so small. 
The question of legislation for the purpose of stamping out 
tuberculosis is an important one. Already some of the states 
in the Union have enacted laws for the purpose, while a few of 
them are quarantining against each other, and others are quar¬ 
antining all herds known to have tuberculous animals among 
them, without any authority other than the general law con¬ 
trolling such contagious and infectious diseases. What the 
result of such" action on the part of the State Board of Health 
and the State veterinarian remains to be seen. The effect of 
one State quarantining against another is to almost ruin the 
cattle industry in the quarantined district. Such a state of 
affairs exists between Vermont and Massachusetts. The latter 
has a law purporting to control* tuberculosis, but its workings 
are anything but satisfactory. The law provides for the ap¬ 
pointment of inspectors, but does not say that they shall be 
veterinarians, nor, in fact, medical men of any kind. The con¬ 
sequence is that incompetent men are appointed, more for their 
political value than anything else. Many of them, I am told, 
do not know a tubercle from a piece of normal tissue, neither do 
they know anything about the tuberculin test. They examine 
in a general way suspected herds, and pronounce them healthy 
or diseased according to their best common judgment. Quali¬ 
fied men are condemned for doing their duty, and ignorant men 
are put in their places. The compensation for animals destroyed 
amounts to little or nothing, consequently the dissatisfaction is 
great. 
Legislation on the subject should not be gone into hastily as 
evidently has been the case in some of our sister states. Such 
legislation is bound to meet with opposition, and finally defeat. 
All sides of the question must be carefully weighed, and pro¬ 
vision made for any point that is likely to arise in the workings 
of the law. 
