Am.  Jour.  Pharm. 
May,  1896. 
Editorial. 
269 
EDITORIAL. 
THE  SEVENTY-FIFTH  ANNIVERSARY  OF  THE  PHILADELPHIA  COLLEGE  OF 
PHARMACY. 
The  Philadelphia  College  of  Pharmacy  has  passed  her  seventy-fifth  mile- 
stone, and  with  renewed  vigor  is  growing  and  advancing  in  the  cause  of  phar- 
maceutical education. 
The  details  of  the  entertainment  by  which  this  event  was  celebrated  will  be 
found  on  another  page.  It  may  be  worth  while,  however,  to  note  here  some 
of  the  facts  which  were  developed  in  the  numerous  able  addresses  by  men  repre- 
senting widely  different  interests. 
First,  it  was  conclusively  shown  that  this  College  is  well  and  favorably  known 
wherever  pharmacy  exists,  but  apparently  least  of  all  in  the  city  of  Philadelphia, 
the  Mayor  confessing  to  having  only  recently  learned  of  the  existence  of  this 
institution,  although  for  a  number  of  years  he  lived  in  its  immediate  vicinity. 
The  second  subject  upon  which  special  stress  was  laid  by  several  speakers 
was  the  magnitude  of  responsibility  under  which  the  pharmacist  constantly 
labors.  The  slightest  variation  from  the  exactions  of  his  profession,  or  the 
failure  to  discover  and  rectify  the  blunder  of  a  physician,  is  sufficient  to  call 
clown  upon  him  the  severest  condemnation  of  the  public  without  the  form- 
ality of  a  hearing. 
Finally,  it  was  conceded  on  all  sides  that  the  Philadelphia  College  of  Phar- 
macy has  steadily  risen  from  a  small  beginning,  until  now  she  stands  among 
the  foremost  institutions  of  the  world,  and  this  without  aid  from  the  State  or 
City  in  which  she  has  been  reared. 
THE  METRIC  SYSTEM  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES. 
In  the  March  number  of  this  Journal  we  printed  the  Hurley  Bill,  designed  to 
require  the  use  of  the  metric  system  of  weights  and  measures  in  this  country. 
Since  then,  House  Bill,  No.  7,251,  introduced  by  the  Hon.  C.  W.  Stone,  has 
been  substituted  for  the  original  bill. 
The  differences  between  the  two  are  slight,  but  we  print  now  the  revised  bill 
as  follows  : 
Jl  Bill  to  fix  the  standard  of  weights  and  measures  by  the  adoption  of  the 
metric  system  of  weights  and  measures. 
"■Be  it  enacted  by  the  Senate  and  House  of  Representatives  of  the  United  States  of  America 
in  Congress  assembled,  That  from  and  after  the  first  day  of  July,  eighteen  hundred  and  ninety- 
•cight,  all  the  Departments  of  the  Government  of  the  United  States,  in  transaction  of  all  busi- 
ness requiring  the  use  of  weight  and  measurement,  except  in  completing  the  survey  of  the 
■public  lands,  shall  employ  and  use  only  the  weights  and  measures  of  the  metric  system. 
"  Sec.  2.  That  from  and  after  the  first  day  of  January,  nineteen  hundred  and  one,  the 
metric  system  of  weights  and  measures  shall  be  the  only  legal  system  of  weights  and  mea- 
sures'recognized  in  the  United  States. 
"Sec.  3.  That  the  metric  system  of  weights  and  measures  herein  referred  to  is  that  in 
which  the  ultimate  standard  of  mass  or  weight  is  the  international  kilogram  of  the  Interna- 
tional Bureau  of  Weights  and  Measures,  established  in  accordance  with  the  convention  of  May 
twentieth,  eighteen  hundred  and  seventy-five,  and  the  ultimate  standard  of  length  is  the 
international  metre  of  the  same  bureau,  the  national  prototypes  of  which  are  kilogram  num- 
bered twenty  and  metre  numbered  twenty-seven,  preserved  in  the  archives  of  the  office  of 
standard  weights  and  measures. 
"  Sec  4.  That  the  tables  in  the  schedules  annexed  to  the  bill  authorizing  the  use  of  the 
