3H 
Editorials. 
f  Am.  .Tour.  Pharin. 
X       June  1S90. 
submitted  as  an  acceptable  substitute  a  bill  drawn  upon  the  lines  of  the  British 
law.  In  the  following  preamble  and  resolutions  which  were  proposed  by  Mr. 
A.  H.  Jones  and  adopted  by  the  Drug  Exchange,  May  17,  the  most  prominent 
objectionable  features  of  this  bill  are  plainly  set  forth  : 
"Whereas,  There  is  now  under  consideration  by  the  Committee  on  Agri- 
culture and  Forestry,  United  States  Senate,  a  bill  entitled  a  bill  '  for  prevent- 
ing adulteration  and  misbranding  food  and  drugs,  and  the  prevention  of  poison- 
ous adulterations,  and  for  other  purposes  ;'  and 
"  Whereas,  The  title  is  misleading,  inasmuch  as  it  does  not,  in  any  manner, 
regulate  adulteration  of  food  and  drugs  within  the  limits  of  the  respective 
States  and  Territories,  but  aims  to  control  the  commerce  in  food  and  drugs 
between  the  several  States  and  Territories  of  this  Union,  as  the  enacting  clause 
clearly  sets  forth  ;  and 
"  Whereas,  The  bill  proposes  to  overturn  business  methods  long  established, 
and  in  all  respects  proper  and  mercantile  ;  restrict  and  embarrass  trade  between 
citizens  of  the  different  States  and  Territories  ;  trample  upon  vested  rights,  and 
impose  regulations  as  burdensome,  arbitrary,  exceptional  and  indefensible,  as 
they  are  needless,  upon  a  class  of  American  citizens  engaged  in  lawful  and 
honorable  calling,  from  which  other  citizens  are  exempt  and  to  be  exempted  ; 
and 
"Whereas,  The  design  of  the  bill  is  to  place  the  manufacture  and  sale  of 
all  drugs,  medicinal  chemicals,  pharmaceutical  preparations  and  proprietary 
medicines,  as  far  as  practicable,  under  the  arbitrary  management  of  the  Secre- 
tary of  Agriculture,  and  to  impose  taxes,  under  the  guise  of  licenses,  so  as  to 
force  us  to  assist  in  defraying  the  expenses  of  a  department  of  the  Govern- 
ment, with  which  we  are  in  no  way  allied  ;  and 
"  Whereas,  The  bill  is  unfriendly  to  us  in  conception — the  agitation  of  the 
subject  being  largely  due  to  the  efforts  on  the  part  of  certain  parties  interested 
in  Farmers'  Alliances  to  secure  signatures  to  petitions  printed  and  circulated 
so  as  to  influence  the  Committee  on  Agriculture  and  exaggerate  the  extent  of 
adulteration  ;  and 
"Whereas,  The  bill  is  faulty  in  construction — as  may  readily  be  compre- 
hended when  the  members  of  the  Committee  on  Agriculture  confessedly  were 
so  ignorant  of  the  subject  as  to  be  unable  to  define  what  a  compounded  drug 
meant,  according  to  their  own  bill  ;  and 
"Whereas,  The  bill  is  tyrannical  in  its  provisions,  demanding  that  even, 
manufacturers  of  articles  prepared  according  to  the  United  States  Pharma- 
copoeia, and  other  standard  works  on  materia  medica,  shall  apply  to  the  Secre- 
tary of  Agriculture  for  a  license  to  transport  their  products  out  of  their  own 
States  and  Territories  ;  insisting  that  all  private  formulas  shall  be  submitted  to 
the  Secretary,  and  giving  him  authority  to  decide  which  may  and  may  not  be 
made,  if  intended  to  go  throughout  the  United  States  ;  imposing  not  only  fines, 
but  imprisonment ;  conferring  autocratic  powers  on  one  man  to  humiliate  an 
honorable  body  of  American  citizens  and  to  extort  money  from  them  ;  there- 
fore, be  it 
"  Resolved,  That  we  are  opposed  to  all  needless  interference  with  the  com- 
merce between  the  States  and  the  Territories. 
"Resolved,  That  inasmuch  as  we  are  engaged  in  a  business  thoroughly 
