Jasper County Democrat, Volume 9, Number 11, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 16 June 1906 — MUST HAVE THE LABEL [ARTICLE]

MUST HAVE THE LABEL

That Is To Be the Passport to Transportation of Meat Products Washington, June 14. —A meat inspection provision was completed by the house committee on agriculture and will be presented to the house for action, which it is declared by the committee will insure that United States meats and meat products are healthful, clean, and in every respect wholesome and fit for food. The important features of the legislation are that it places the cost of the inspection on the government, and makes an annual automatic api»ropriation of $2,000,000 to pay the expenses. It requires a rigid post-mortem ami ante-mortem inspection of all animals killed for food. It requires a government label as a passport for all meet and meat products which enter interstate commerce, and In addition to this label a certificate of purity to the carrier and to the secretary of agriculture for such products as enter foreign commerce. To secure this label the product must be handled in accordance with sanitary regulations to be prescribed by the secretary of agriculture. The violation of any of the provisions of the regulations is made a misdemeanor punishable by a fine not to exceed SIO,OOO, or Imprisonment not to exceed two years.. Tliere is a special penalty against the bribery of inspectors, being imprisonment from one to three years and fine of from SI,OOO to SIO,OOO for offering a bribe, and the same punishment for the acceptance of a bribeon the part of inspectors. Farmers and small butchers are excepted from the operation of the regulations.