By Harvey W. Wiley, MD
Summary: In this letter to President Calvin Coolidge, Dr. Harvey Wiley—the "father of the Pure Food and Drug Law" of 1906—calls to task the U.S. government for continued failure to enforce the food safety law, and he exhorts the president to "free the law from the illegal restrictions and the practical paralysis which have been inflicted upon it by the high officials in the Department of Agriculture." Wiley cites numerous examples of food adulteration at the time that appear to be squarely in violation of the law, including the use of nitrous oxides in the bleaching of flour as well as the addition of chemicals such as alum, sodium benzoate, and sulfur dioxide to packaged foods. "The proper enforcement of the Food and Drugs Act is intimately related to the public health," Wiley writes. If only Coolidge had felt the same way. 1925.
View PDF: Letter to the President [by Dr. Wiley]
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