Imported foods. Section II of the law provides for the inspection of foods while still in the hands of the customs officers or under bond. This greatly facilitates the prevention of importation of adulterated food, and it is believed that comparatively little adulterated food is now imported. When adulterated food bearing labels indicating a foreign origin is found in the American market the possibility of fraudulent labeling is also to be considered. Note that, as an additional precaution in the case of imported foods, the law forbids the importation of any kind of food which is forbidden entry to, or forbidden to be sold or restricted in sale in, the country in which it is made or from which it is exported. Private importations. In Food Inspection Decision 88 it is held that no food or drug which is adulterated or misbranded within the meaning of the act shall be brought into the United States from abroad even if only for the consumption of the importer or for free distribution. Such private importations are subject to the same rules and restrictions as ordinary commercial imports. State and Municipal Food Control Since the Federal authorities cannot inspect or control any food which is produced and consumed in the same state, it is evident that each of the forty-eight states must have adequate legislation and inspection if its citizens are to obtain the full benefit of the pure food movement. In order fully to realize the importance of state and municipal control, one must remember that some of the foods most readily subjected to fraudulent adulteration (e.g. milk) and some of those most subject to dangerous contamination (e.g. meats and shellfish) are largely handled by producers and dealers who do a local business and so do not come under the authority of the Federal government. Slaughtering and meat packing is now a highly centralized industry and is regulated both by the Food and Drugs Act and by a special Meat Inspection Law (see Chapter VI and Appendix D), yet about half the meat consumed in the United States is slaughtered in local establishments which are never visited by the Federal inspectors because they do no interstate business. The rural population and the residents of small towns, who together make up about one half the people of the United States, derive relatively little direct benefit from the Federal law. Indirectly they benefit in proportion as the Federal legislation and inspection serves to stimulate and standardize that of the states. At the present time most of the states have on their statute books food laws which are modeled more or less directly after the Federal law and which are fairly satisfactory in so far as they are enforced. Rarely, however, are sufficient funds appropriated to make possible a strict enforcement of the state law. On the other hand, state laws may be more stringent in some respects than those of the Federal government. Thus several states limit the time that food may be held in cold storage. The new (1914) Sanitary Code of New York State makes it unlawful for any person "affected with any communicable disease to handle food or food products in any manner whatever." The responsibility of the enforcement of state food laws is lodged sometimes with health officers, sometimes with the commissioner of agriculture, sometimes with a food commissioner independent of either the department of agriculture or of health. Not infrequently the office of "dairy and food commissioner " has developed through the fact that legal regulation of the milk supply and dairy industry antedated general food legislation. Whatever the organization, it is important that the enforcement of the state food laws be in the hands of permanent officials, scientifically trained, gifted with good judgment and administrative capacity, and entirely independent of politics. State legislation and inspection may be supplemented by municipal ordinances enforced by distinct corps of officers. In New York City, for example, the board of health has the power to enact a sanitary code which becomes law on publication without requiring the approval of any other body or official. This code contains general rules for food control, and additional rules and regulations to govern certain industries are also promul gated by the board and thus become part of, and have the legal force of, the code. The board of health has the power to control any food industry by requiring that it be carried on only under permits granted by (and revokable by) the board. Violations of the sanitary code may be punished either by criminal prosecution or civil suit. The policy has been to bring criminal prosecution in all cases of actual adulteration. In 1913 there were 118 inspectors connected with the New York City division of food inspection, of whom 41 were assigned to general food inspection, 19 to country milk inspection, 29 to city milk inspection, and 18 were sanitary inspectors engaged in the supervision of physical conditions in establishments where food is prepared or sold; there were also 4 medical inspectors and 7 veterinarians. For the laboratory examination of food the city employed 8 chemists with 7 technical and clerical assistants and 4 bacteriologists with 10 assistants. Furthermore, the city requires that the following food industries be carried on only under official permits and specific regulations: dealers in milk and all places where milk is sold; slaughterhouses, including poultry-killing establishments; sausage factories; egg-breaking establishments; establishments for the bottling of " soft drinks"; or for the manufacture of ice cream and other frozen products. In all probability the next few years will see a marked development of state and municipal food control along lines consistent with the Federal food inspection, but in some cases even more exacting, as, for example, in requiring the grading and classification of market milk and not simply that it be free from adulteration or misbranding. REFERENCES ABBOTT. Food and Drug Inspection. Article in Reference Handbook of the Medical Sciences, Vol. 3, pages 162-180. BELL. Sale of Food and Drugs Act (British). BIGELOW. Foods and Food Control. United States Department of Agriculture, Bureau of Chemistry, Bulletin 69. BUCHKA. Die Nahrungsmittelgesetzgebung in Deutschen Reiche. DUNN. Pure Food and Drug Legal Manual. LEACH. Food Inspection and Analysis. NEUFELDT. Der Nahrungsmittelchemiker als Sachverständiger. PARRY. Foods and Drugs, Vol. 2. Proceedings of the Association of State and National Dairy and Food Departments. United States Department of Agriculture. Food Inspection Decisions and Notices of Judgment. WESTERVELT. Pure Food and Drug Laws, Federal and State. WILEY. Foods and Their Adulterations. CHAPTER III MILK MILK is the one article of diet whose sole function in nature is to serve as food. Each species of mammal produces a milk especially adapted to the nutritive requirements of its own young, but it was early learned that the milk of other species is also an excellent food for man, and several different species are used for dairy purposes in various parts of the world. In general only cows' milk is of much commercial importance, and the statements which follow refer always to cows' milk unless otherwise explained. 1 The amount of milk consumed as such 1 in the United States is estimated at one half pint to one third of a quart per person per day. This amounts to some 25,000,000 to 30,000,000 quarts per day for the country as a whole. If the average retail value is about 5 cents a quart, the milk industry of the country will be seen to amount to over $1,250,000 a day or over $400,000,000 per year. The importance of the milk industry to the community is much greater than its money value (as compared with other industries) would imply. It is probable that the quality of the milk supply bears a closer relation to the public health than does that of any other food. This is partly because of the exceptional nutritive qualities of milk and the prominent part which it plays in the diet of children and others to whom the quality of the food is of special importance, and partly because the 1 A much larger quantity is used for the manufacture of butter and cheese. These industries will be described later. |