able to all. However, I believe that there would be great objection if the body of the $3,000 car were placed on the casis of the $700 car without some method of indicating this change to the purchaser. Similarily I see no reason why the cheaper fat used in oleomargarine should be given a new body and sold as a butter substitute without giving the consuming public simple methods of distinguishing between them.

STATEMENT OF DR. T. W. GULLICKSON, ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF DAIRY HUSBANDRY, UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA, ST. PAUL, MINN.

This is a brief summary of the experimental work carried on during recent years by the writer at the Minnesota Agricultural Experiment Station, relating to the comparative nutritive value of various fats as determined in tests with young dairy calves. The following fats were used in the trials: Milk fat, corn oil (Majola and amaizo), cottonseed oil (wesson), soybean oil (high grade), cocoanut oil, peanut oil, lard, and beef tallow. A total of over 50 calves were used. All tests or trials were carried on under similar conditions. In all cases, each fat was added in the proper amount to skim milk, after which the mixture was homogenized to form a filled milk containing 3.5 percent fat. Healthy, thrifty young calves were used. They were fed whole milk (colostrum, first day or two) until they were about 2 weeks old, and then gradually shifted to the desired fat-filled milk product. Test periods ranged from a few days to nearly 6 months in length.

Hay and concentrates (low fat content) usually were not fed until after the calf was a month old, and in some cases no hay was fed. All calves were fed supplements that provided them with adequate amounts of vitamins A and D essential mineral elements. All animals were weighed and observed regularly.

Marked differences, both in their appearance and general well-being, were observed in groups of calves fed the various fats previously mentioned. In all cases, the calves receiving the milk fat made the largest daily gains, were in the most desirable physical condition, and ex-celled in general appearance. It may be significant that they also showed the greatest fat deposits in the carcasses, as revealed by post mortem examinations. They were followed closely in these various respects by the calves fed the lard and tallow filled milks. The calves in the cocoanut oil and peanut oil groups were on the whole inferior to those fed lard and tallow, but were definitely superior in growth and appearance to the animals in the corn oil, cottonseed oil, and soybean oil groups. Following is the average daily rate of gain in weight of the calves in the various groups while on experiment:

The calves in the corn, cottonseed, and soybean oil groups invariably appeared thin and emaciated, with rough and upkempt hair, and some of them also showed a characteristic acrodynia, or loss of hair, the area about the face, ears, and neck being first affected. Occasionally, a brown oil-like crust covered parts of the denuded areas. Some of the calves in these groups died, and others probably would have done so if the fat in their diet had not been greatly decreased or wholly replaced by milk fat. Several calves, when in a very weakened condition and unable to stand on their feet, made remarkable recoveries after milk fat was introduced into their ration.

The reason for the marked superiority of the milk fat over the other fats tested is not clear. Some of the data now being obtained suggests that the less satisfactory fats and oils probably are absorbed as completely as butterfat, but whether they soon afterwards are eliminated through the gut has not yet been determined. There is a possibility that they are excreted through the skin, causing the dermatitis-like condition described.

Several other workers, including Hart at the Wisconsin Station, and Freeman at Northwestern University, have likewise found milk fat superior in nutritive value to various vegetable oils tested. Their studies were conducted with rats as the experimental subjects.

STATEMENT OF DR. C. A. IVERSON, HEAD, DAIRY INDUSTRY DEPARTMENT, IOWA STATE COLLEGE, AMES, IOWA

The matter of soybean oil used in oleomargarine has frequently been discussed as though the midwestern farmer who produces both soybeans and butterfat would not be injured if the present market for butterfat through butter were taken over by soybean oil through oleomargarine. A survey of the facts in the case do not warrant this view.

The average yield of soybeans in Iowa which contains 25 percent of all the top grade land in the United States is 21 bushels per acre. -Although I have been for some years a grower of soybeans on my two farms, I do not like to grow them. They are "hard on the land" in that they remove soil fertility rapidly and leave the soil loose, thereby, causing rapid erosion. They frequently do not mature before a killing frost hits them and an early snow tends to damage them badly. Under present conditions, it does not pay to sell the beans but rather to feed the entire bean cracked or ground to livestock. As to the return to the farmer from soybean oil it is practically nil. The reason soybeans sell at the present price is due to the price of soybean meal, the market for which is created by the dairy cow and here are the figures.

The market price (in town) for soybeans at present is $1.80 per bushel of 60 pounds. This yields under present methods of processing 8 pounds of oil and 48 pounds of soybean meal per bushel. The price today (in town) of soybean meal at the Ames Reliable Products Co., Ames, Iowa is $3 per hundred pounds if and when meal is obtainable. Results at the Iowa Experiment Station indicate that soybeans cracked or ground are at least equal in value for dairy cows to soybean meal and probably up to one third more. The farmer,

therefore, receives the same price or less per pound for beans that he pays for meal. The values of the two are the same and since the market for beans is in town and the meal must be picked up in town the farmer is out at least the hauling costs. Early last spring, on one of my farms, we were threatened with a leaky granary roof and so were forced to sell some soybeans at $1.26 per bushel. They contained a considerable percentage of green beans due to frost damage but they were dry and just as good feed and so far as I know would yield just as much oil as first-grade beans, yet we had to sell them at $1.26 per bushel or 2.1 cents per pound and soybean meal was selling at $50 per ton or 2.5 cents per pound. At these figures we lost at least $8 per ton by selling the beans.

Where the price of beans and meal is the same (3 cents per pound) as at the present time the farmer is getting, at the most, 3 cents per pound of fat less the cost of hauling in the beans and hauling back the meal. That it is poor economy for him to sell fat at such a price is clearly indicated in comparing it with present prices for corn. Corn is largely corn starch and fat yields 2.25 times as many calories as starch. A pound of soybean fat at 3 cents would, therefore, be equivalent to starch at 1.33 cents per pound or corn at approximately 75 cents per bushel. With corn selling at 93 cents at the elevator and at $1.30 to $1.50 by feeding it to livestock it is clearly seen that the farmer is getting little or nothing from the soybean oil. If he jeopardizes the market for soybean meal through the dairy cow even the present price of beans cannot be supported. If he jeopardizes the market for butterfat which brings 56 cents per pound on the farm with another fat for which he receives virtually no return he will find himself in a bad way indeed.

STATEMENT OF CARL S. PATON, SECRETARY, THE NATIONAL DAIRY UNION,

CHICAGO, ILL.

For more than 40 years, representatives of the National Dairy Union have closely followed and studied trade and legislative problems which involve, directly or indirectly, natural milk products and products made in imitation thereof. That interest and concern continues.

Two distinguished early officers of the National Dairy Union, the late Governor Hoard of Wisconsin and Charles Y. Knight, were key figures in focusing the attention of the Nation and Congress on the problems which developed in the United States in connection with the introduction of oleomargarine.

As early as 1886, Congress recognized the fraud potential of products made to resemble butter, and as the inability of local and state law enforcement agencies to deal with the problem became apparent, enacted legislation defining all such products as oleomargarine and, for the purpose of bringing their manufacture and sale under Federal regulation, levied a tax on the products at the rate of 2 cents per pound. President Cleveland signed the bill.

At the time the initial tax was levied the relative price differential between butter and oleomargarine was a matter of a few cents, and the law was effective. But as the price of butter advanced in relation to that of oleomargarine due to changing economic conditions and improvements in the manufacturing technique for butter, the

butter-oleomargarine price differential widened, with butter prices advancing. Soon the price margin reached a point where the incentive for selling bogus butter was revived even with the manufacturers paying the 2 cents per pound tax and observing at least the letter of the Federal law. Fraud broke out on a devastating scale. Again local, State, and even Federal agencies were unable to cope with the illegal traffic.

On January 26, 1901, the majority report of the House Committee on Agriculture and Forestry described the situation as follows:

So far as the identification of the commodity (oleomargarine) is concerned, the law of 1886 has been successful. So far as the identification of the commodity to the consumer is concerned, the law of 1886 is of little value, the evidence being that a very large proportion of the oleomargarine manufactured goes to the consumer finally as butter, either as a purchaser of the retailer or as a guest at a hotel, restaurant, or boarding house.

On May 9, 1902, the Grout bill was enacted by Congress as a supplement to the law of 1886. This measure fixed a tax of 10 cents per pound upon oleomargarine colored yellow. The code also contained other provisions intended to standardize the composition of butter, providing safeguards to consumers and producers as to adulterations of butter and in the manufacture and sale of renovated and process butter.

These laws have stood for 40 years as among the most constructive and effective Congress has provided in the interest of fair trade and honest dealings in food products. Under these laws fraud in the sale of both butter and oleomargarine have been brought under reasonably effective control and American consumers and producers of both products enjoy the proved benefits.

These are the laws which the proponents of H. R. 2400 seek to repeal, so far as the laws apply to domestically produced oleomargarine. Advocates of reepal of the Federal oleomargarine laws offer an assortment of contentions, chief among which are the following:

1. That vitamin fortified oleomargarine now possesses nutritional properties equal to those of buttter. 2. That fraud in the sale of oleomargarine as butter is a negligible consideration.

3. That promulgation of a standard of identity for oleomargarine under the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act of 1938 offers adequate protection to consumers of butter and makes it unnecessary longer to regulate the manufacture and sale of the product by the Federal tax system.

4. That under existing wartime conditions, the need for food fats is greatly increased and that the existing oleomargarine tax code is operating to deprive millions of consumers of a low-cost healthful food fat.

VITAMIN A MADE AN ISSUE

Witnesses supporting contention No. 1, which lays stress on the relation nutritionally between butter and oleomargarine, have developed a phase that is irrelevant for the simple reason that the Federal oleomargarine tax laws are antifraud laws, not nutrition laws. Their prime purpose is to offer assurance that when a consumer purchases a pound of butter he gets a pound of legal butter and not something else even something "as good or better."

Because so much emphasis has been placed on nutrition, however, it is interesting to examine the contention.

We are told that oleomargarine, synthetically fortified with vitamins A (presumably 9,000 units) and D and otherwise complying with

provisions of the food and drug standard is equal to natural vitamin butter in nutritive value. Experimental data from qualified sources indicating the nutritional superiority of butterfat over artificially fortified vegetable oils, is brought into question by some proponents of H. R. 2400.

While I do not qualify as an authority on nutrition, it seems obvious that the whole field of nutritional research is in a progressive and everchanging state. Few experts in nutrition will say that research in their field has advanced to the point where irrevocable conclusions can be drawn about the relative merits of edible fats which are natural carriers of vitabins and those to which the vitamins are added synthetically.

On this point the report of the council of foods and nutrition of the American Medical Association, dated August 1942, provides confirmation. The report contains this statement:

Since the nutritional factors have not all been identified, and since butter contains numerous additional fatty acids of unknown nutritional significance, the consuming public has a right to demand that the practice of identifying oleomargarine and butter so that anyone can differentiate between them should be continued.

But even if it be assumed that the vitamin A value of fortified oleomargarine, as now known, is equal to that of butter, this again merely puts the question back to the basis existing in 1900, when nothing was known about vitamins. It should be noted that witnesses appearing before the House Committee on Agriculture in 1901 presented scientific data of that day to show that oleomargarine was equal to or superior to butter in point of digestibility.

Mr. J. C. Duff, a chemist, was described as arriving at this conclusion:

The nutritive value of both butter and butterine consists almost entirely of fats. The quality of fats are the same in both; the fats of butterine contain nothing that the fats of butter do not contain, hence, there can be no difference in the food value of them, except that the thermal or heat-producing properties of the butterine fats are superior to those of butter, and consequently more valuable to the human system as a food.

The inference has also been drawn that the absence or low content of vitamin A was the scientific argument advanced for the present oleomargarine tax laws. Nothing was known of vitamin A in 1902. Fraud was the issue then, just as now.

Because of the emphasis placed on the factor of nutrition by the proponents of H. R. 2400 and because this phase also enters into the broader pattern of wartime Government food policy, the subject will be dealt with again later in this testimony. At this point, however, it is desired to introduce some further comment on the vitamin A value of butter.

VITAMIN A MINIMUM OF BUTTER NEAR 9000 UNITS

Research recently has been undertaken by the United States Department of Agriculture in conjunction with the Association of Land Grant Colleges in a score of butter-producing States to determine the vitamin A potency of butter. The project was originally recommended by the Committee on Food and Nutrition of the National Research Council, the organization which has given the subject of relative food value of butter and oleomargarine much attention in recent years.