This thread is meant to shed light on the Issue Ben Roberts brought up on USDA INSPECTED MEAT.
Please keep all posting on this thread relevant to the topic. Articles and facts surrounding this topic are encouraged.
Ben Roberts:
Please keep all posting on this thread relevant to the topic. Articles and facts surrounding this topic are encouraged.
Ben Roberts:
In 1905, Uption Sinclair wrote a novel titled The Jungle. In writing his novel Upton Sinclair also exposed the unsanitary conditions that existed in the large meat packing plants of Swift, Armour and Morris.
When the public read this novel, the consumption of meat fell dramatically. The packers had to do something very quickly to convince the public that their products were safe and wholesome. Influenced by the packers, President Theodore Roosevelt contacted Uption Sinclair and ask him to write a report about the conditions that existed in Chicago. In closing his seven page report to the President, Uption Sinclair said:
" I might add that when I was in Chicago, I learned a good deal about the connections which the packers have in Washington, so I think it most likly that before the Department of Agriculture got anybody started for the purpose of investigating Packingtown, word had been sent there to the packinghouses that things should be cleaned up. I know positively that this was done in the case of Major Seaman, who went out there for Collier's Weekly."
Little did Uption Sinclair know that the influence of the big packers went all the way to the President of the United States.
President Roosevelt concluded, "Who knows the meatpacking business better than the meatpackers?" He ask the big packers to help write the new meat inspection laws.
The big packers then came up with a way to convince the public that their meat products were pure and wholesome. The Meat Inspection Act was passed on June 30th of 1906, which was the last day of the fiscal year, so it was sure to pass without opposition. The Meat Inspection Act was written by the big packers. It should be remembered, however, that Federal jurisdiction is limited to interstate and foreign commerce, and that this inspection can only be legally applied to establishments doing interstate and foreign business. But the Federal inspection does not and can not reach the establishments doing business exclusively within the state. Such packing plants must be looked after by the state and municipal authorities. In the absence of an efficient local inspection, consumers were urged to look for meat bearing the Government label. At that time Swift, Armour, Morris and Cudahy were the only packing firms that were doing interstate and foreign business. So it was only their products that had the Government's stamp that insured the public that their products were pure and wholesome.
The packers backed the Meat Inspection Act, which they had written, for marketing reasons. J.O. Armour said" The Meat Inspection Act was the greatest form of advertisement the meat packers ever had." They knew that if the U.S. Government stamped their approval on meat products the public would except that as good.
The big packers even paid the inspectors' wages for two years. After the public overwhelmingly accepted the USDA Inspected stamp of approval on meat products, the big packers then said they would no longer pay the government employees wages, thus letting the government bear the expense of marketing the meat packer's products.
Now where is the fraud, or is it only fraud depending on who is doing it?
Ben Roberts