Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 August 2014
1 The jurisdiction of the national and state governments with regard to pure food and drugs legislation has been a subject for judicial consideration. National authority over interstate commerce is comprehensive under Art. 1, Sec. 8, of the Constitution, which empowers Congress “to regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes.” But the states exercise supreme authority over manufacturing and intrastate commerce, and they may even supplement Congressional statutes, provided they do not interfere with interstate commerce. In the case of Weigle v. Curtice Brothers Company, 248 U. S. 285, 288 (1919), the Court held that “the fact that a food or drug might be condemned by Congress if it passed from state to state, does not carry an immunity of foods or drugs, making the same passage, that it does not condemn.…. When objects of commerce get within the sphere of state legislation the state may exercise its independent judgment and prohibit what Congress did not see fit to forbid.” Other discussions are presented in Savage v. Jones, state chemist of Indiana, 225 U. S. 501 (1912); McDermott v. State of Wisconsin, 228 U. S. 115 (1913); Corn Products Refining Company v. Eddy et al., 249 U. S. 427 (1919); State of Minnesota on the relation of Whipple v. Martinson, 256 U. S. 41 (1921); and Lynch v. Tilden Produce Company, 265 U. S. 315 (1924).
2 Foods; Their Composition and Analysis (London 1882), pp. 4–16Google Scholar. Cf. Brend, W. A., Health and the State (1917)Google Scholar; Greenfield, K. R., Sumptuary Law in Nuremberg (1918)Google Scholar; Baldwin, F. E., Sumptuary Legislation and Personal Regulation in England (1926)Google Scholar; and Weber, G. A., The Food, Drug, and Insecticide Administration (1928)Google Scholar.
3 34 Stat. L., 768; 9 Stat. L., 237.
4 They were: Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Missouri, New Hampshire, New Jersey, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Washington, West Virginia, and Wisconsin.
5 Acts of the General Assembly (1847–48), p. 112.
6 The following dates of pure food and drugs acts in the several states may not be entirely exhaustive, but their chronological arrangement will indicate the gradual development of such legislation in each commonwealth and in the country at large:
Florida, 1832 (packing law), 1889, 1907, '11, '13;
Virginia, 1847, 1889–90, '91, '93–'94, '97, 1908;
West Virginia (1847), 1882, '85, '91, 1907;
Wisconsin, 1849, '58, '87, '89, '91, '93, '95, '97, '98, '99, 1903, '05, '07, '09, '11, '13, '21;
Iowa, 1851, '80, '86, '88, '97, 1907, '11, '13, '15, '19, '23 (inspection of eating places);
Ohio, 1853 (labeling of poisons), 1865 (wines), 1882, '84, '85, '86, '87, '89, '90, '91, '94, '96, 1919;
New Mexico, 1854, '65, '89;
Rhode Island, 1857, '96, 1908, '09, '15, '16, '17, '18, '19;
Pennsylvania, 1860, '78, '85, '87, '91, '93, '95, '97, '99, 1901, '03, '07, '17, '23;
New Jersey, 1865, '81, '82, '83, '85, '86, '87, '95, '96, '99, 1901, '07;
Kentucky, 1868, '70, '93, '98, 1900, '18;
Wyoming, 1869, 1905, '11, '13, '15, '20, '21;
Michigan, 1871, '73, '75, '81, '87, '89, '93, '95, '97, '99, 1903, '05, '09, '11, '15, '23;
Alaska, 1900 (code);
Illinois, 1874, '77, '79, '81, '83, '85, '87, '89, '97, '99, 1901, '07, '15, '17, '19, '21;
Kansas, 1874, '85, '89, '91, '97, 1901, '07, '09, '13;
Utah, 1876. '88, '96, '99, 1903, '07, '13, '19;
Louisiana, 1880, '82, '86, '98, 1906, 1914;
Mississippi, 1880, 1910, '18;
Minnesota, 1881, '86, '87, '91, '95, '97, '99, 1901, '05, '13, '21;
Massachusetts, 1882, '85, '86, '87, '89, '91, '94, '96, 1914, '17, '19, '21 (regulation of manufacture of non-alcoholic beverages);
Idaho, 1887, '99, 1905, '11, '17, 1921;
Indiana, 1883, '89, '94, '99, 1901, '07;
Maine, 1883, '89, '95, '11, '13, '19, '23;
Nebraska, 1883, '91, '95, '97, '99, 1913, '15, '19, '21;
Arkansas, 1885, '91, '93, 1907;
Missouri, 1885, '89, '91, '97, 1907;
North Dakota, 1885, '95, '97, '99, '23;
South Carolina, 1885, '96, '98, 1907, '22;
Colorado, 1887, '93, '95, 1907, '15, '18, '21;
Maryland, 1888, '90, 1900, '10;
Connecticut, 1889, '93, '95, 1907, '15, '18, '21;
Oregon, 1889, '93, '99, 1915, '17, '19, '23;
Georgia, 1890, '91, '95, '96, 1906, '13;
Oklahoma, 1890, '93, 1909, '15;
Nevada, 1891, 1913, '16 (hotel inspection law), '21;
New Hampshire, 1891, '95, '99, 1901, '07;
Washington, 1891, '97, '99, 1901, '05, '07, '17, '21, '23;
California, 1893, '95, '97, 1900–01, '05, '07, '09;
New York, 1893, '94, '98, 1900, '19, '10, '23;
Alabama, 1894–95, '96–'97, 1909, '19, '20;
Vermont, 1894, 1904, '08, '12, '17;
Delaware, 1895, '99, 1907, '21, '22;
Montana, 1895, 1901, '11, '19, '25 (regulation of ice cream and cheese factories and adoption of the Babcock test);
North Carolina, 1895, '99, 1905, '07, '09, '13, '15;
Tennessee, 1895, '97, 1907, '09, '11, '13;
South Dakota, 1897, '99, 1909, '13, '15, '17, '23;
Texas, 1897, '99, 1907, '09, '11 (food and drug commissioner charged with enforcement of anti-narcotic law);
Hawaii, 1898;
Arizona, 1901, '12, '18.
Elaborate details pertaining to food and drug legislation in the states and in foreign countries prior to 1901 is presented in Senate Report No. 3, 57 Cong., 1 Sess., 1902. Tabulated data pertaining to adulterated commodities and investigators' reports are exhibited in Hearings before the House Committee on Interstate and Foreign Commerce, 57 Cong., 1 Sess., 1902. Later volumes of legal data include Breed, W. C., Digest of State Laws (1907)Google Scholar, and Breed, , Abbott, , and Morgan, , Digest of National and State Food Laws (1916)Google Scholar. J. Westervelt, American Pure Food and Drug Laws, contains administrative rules and regulations and voluminous citations of decisions. C. W. Dunn's pure food and drug legal manual includes food standards and inspection decisions. J. S. Abbott and W. C. Burnet, Manual of Procedure for the Guidance of City and State Health, Food, and Drug Officials, is of technical value. The 1924 compilation of federal and state acts pertaining to this subject includes Canadian laws. W. Robertson and M. Herzog, Meat and Food Inspection, presents extracts of English acts. An excellent general treatise, W. W. Thornton, The Law of Pure Food and Drugs, is rich in footnote citations of state court decisions.
7 They were: Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Texas, Utah, Vermont, West Virginia, and Wisconsin.
8 Thornton, W. W., The Law of Pure Food and Drugs, p. 88Google Scholar.
9 80 Maryland 164, cited in ibid.
10 Annual Report of the Michigan Bureau of Dairying (1923), p. 31.
11 Fourth Annual Report of the Division of Feed Inspection, Minnesota State Dairy and Food Commission (1922), p. 31.
12 Fourteenth Biennial Report of the Dairy and Food Commission of the State of Oregon (1923).
13 38 Stat. L., 372.
14 Official Proceedings of the Twenty-Second Annual Convention of the Association of American Dairy, Food, and Drug Officials (1918), p. 165.
15 Biennial Report of the Dairy and Food Commissioner of the State of Oregon (1923), pp. 7–8.
16 Report of the Committee on Municipal Health Department Practice of the American Public Health Association, in Coöperation with the United States Public Health Service, U. S. Public Health Bulletin No. 196, pp. 190–191. Cf. Dr. C. V. Chapin, Report on State Public Health Work, made under the direction of the Council on Health and Public Instruction of the American Medical Association (1915). Pp. 80–96 treat of local health administration and the state.
17 Annual Report of Department of Agriculture (1917), p. 207.
18 Notice is served that “information appearing in the Food and Drug Review is confidential. Readers are requested not to make public anything from the Review without first obtaining permission from the bureau of chemistry.”
19 U. S. Department of Agriculture Circular 137 (1924), p. 15.
20 Program of Work of the United States Department of Agriculture for the Fiscal Year 1919, p. 315.
21 Fourth Annual Report of the Division of Feed Inspection, Minnesota State Dairy and Food Commission (1922), p. 31.
22 Biennial Report of the Dairy and Food Commissioner of the State of Oregon (1923), p. 7.
23 Annual Report of the Chemist, Department of Agriculture (1924), p. 25.
24 Annual Report of the Department of Agriculture (1920), pp. 264–265.
25 Ibid. (1922), p. 276.
26 House Hearings on the Agricultural Appropriation Bill for 1924, p. 262.
27 Report of Proceedings of the Second Annual Convention of the National Pure Food and Drug Congress (1899), pp. 32–33.
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