Theodore Roosevelt Quotes
I recommend that a law be enacted to regulate interstate commerce in misbranded and adulterated foods, drinks, and drugs.... Traffic in foodstuffs which have been debased or adulterated so as to injure health or to deceive purchasers should be forbidden.
A Pure Food bill had failed to pass the Congress for years until Roosevelt took up the cause. The modern federal role in the quality control of food products had its origins with TR.
Theodore Roosevelt, 1858-1919, 26th President of the United States (Republican, NY), Annual Message to Congress, December 5, 1905
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
What is fascinating about this quotation is that each year in the United States millions of Americans get sick from contaminated food. Well over 100,000 need to be hospitalized, and over 3000 Americans die from food borne illness. Yet this Congressman from an agricultural state can make such an absurd statement. The US is better than most counties in terms of food safety, and is much improved over the last decades. However, it is certainly not COMPLETELY safe. Ideologically, he was trying to ward off calls for increased Federal Regulation of the Food System which he believed could not be as successful at making the system more safe as if the food industry engaged in self regulation. But it is common in modern politics to completely depart from the truth if the truth might create public and political pressure for legislation that the Congressman was ideologically opposed to. The end of reducing Federal Regulation for him justified a blatant untruth which misled the public who believed him. Worse, Americans have less trust in anything their legislators say as more and more are exposed making statements like this.
The Ministry of Health had conducted inspections of Lebanese Restaurants, rarely done in the past, and found many with traces of human and animal feces in the food. Typically bribes would be paid to the inspectors but a new reform minister made honest inspections a high priority. Then when he made the results public and newspapers like this carried the message, most of the other government ministers were very upset as it held the country up to ridicule and greatly threatened the international reputation of the country for the finest food in the Middle East, and might further harm the Tourist business which their self-inflicted civil war had already damaged in the latter part of the 20th century and by the militarized standoff that had evolved since. See {642413} for the Health Minister’s statement triggering this headline.
This is one of the earliest examples of regulation for consumer protection. Later, the Magna Carta would incorporate the concept of standard weights and measures.
In 1905 President Roosevelt supported a Pure Food act. Business interests opposed it with such arguments as:
See {642413} for the reaction of one of the major local newspapers.
Theodore Roosevelt Jr., often referred to as Teddy or his initials T. R., was an American statesman, conservationist, naturalist, historian, and writer, who served as the 26th president of the United States from 1901 to 1909. He previously served as 33rd governor of New York from 1899 to 1900 and the 25th vice president of the United States from March to September 1901. Roosevelt emerged as a leader of the Republican Party and became a driving force for anti-trust and Progressive policies.
