^oVimbe^woo!1"}      National  Wholesale  Druggists  Association.  527 
Committee  on  Legislation  has  constantly  been  on  the  alert  to  defeat 
proposed  laws,  State  and  National,  which  would  have  seriously 
affected  the  interests  of  the  retailers  as  well  as  the  wholesalers.  The 
movement  for  the  repeal  of  the  Stamp  Tax  in  the  eighties  received 
the  hearty  and  influential  support  of  the  N.W.D.A.;  and  it  will 
not  be  denied  that  without  this  support  its  repeal  probably  would 
not  have  been  accomplished.  When  it  again  became  necessary  to 
impose  a  Stamp  Tax  to  meet  the  expenses  of  the  Spanish  War,  our 
Legislative  Committee  closely  watched  the  interests  of  the  propri- 
etors and  the  wholesalers  and  the  retailers ;  but  to  the  Legislative 
Committee  of  the  Proprietary  Association  must  be  given  the  credit 
of  securing  the  very  important  modification  in  the  rate  of  this  Stamp 
Tax  before  it  was  enacted  into  law  by  the  Senate.  The  movement 
in  favor  of  its  entire  repeal,  which  we  hope  will  be  successfully  ac- 
complished at  the  approaching  session  of  Congress,  is  receiving 
probably  its  most  influential  support  from  the  N.A.R.D.;  but  the 
committee  of  the  N.W.D.A.  is  certainly  seconding  their  efforts  in  a 
very  efficient  manner. 
The  reports  of  the  Committee  on  Adulterations  have  a  value 
which  is  not  always,  I  fear,  fully  appreciated  by  the  pharmacists  of 
this  country,  nor,  for  that  matter,  by  our  own  membership.  A  care- 
ful study  of  the  reports  which  this  committee  has  made  at  the  sev- 
eral annual  meetings  of  our  Association  will  show  that  public  atten- 
tion is  called,  through  these  reports,  to  many  adulterations  which 
are  largely  minimized,  if  not  entirely  corrected,  through  this  very 
publicity.  In  addition  to  this,  our  organization  is  now,  by  its  action 
at  the  last  three  annual  meetings,  squarely  on  record  as  favoring  a 
National  Pure  Food  and  Drug  Law,  and  its  representatives  have 
been  influential,  in  the  several  sessions  of  the  Pure  Food  Congress 
in  Washington,  in  recommending  modifications  of  the  law  as  origi- 
nally proposed,  to  render  it  less  onerous  to  the  retail  and  wholesale 
drug  trade  of  the  United  States. 
The  organization  was  called  into  existence  at  a  time  when  its 
founders  felt  that  it  was  necessary  that  some  concerted  action  should 
be  secured  to  correct  crying  evils.  It  has  been  successfully  main- 
tained during  many  more  years  than  its  early  founders  dared  to 
hope  it  would  continue  in  existence,  and  it  promises  to  maintain  its 
influence  so  long  as  its  officers  and  members  will  hold  to  the  objects 
named  in  the  preamble  to  the  constitution  which  was  adopted  when 
the  organization  was  formed  in  1876,  as  follows: 
