Ruminations
| Publication year | 2013 |
| Pages | 8 |
| Citation | Vol. 38 No. 4 Pg. 8 |
Winter, 2013
THE LEGAL HISTORY OF VERMONT BUTTER
Paul S. Gillies, Esq.
The whole idea, originally, was converting milk into something else, something that would not spoil as fast as milk. So we have butter and cheese. Butter comes from cream, which contains butterfat and buttermilk. You churn cream to separate the two, and there you have it—a semi-solid, spread-able, yellow mass of animal fat. It's portable and it lasts, without melting, in northern climes, and, aside from its own nutritional value, it improves the taste and digestibility of what we eat. Pass the butter, please.
You wouldn't think of the law when you are spreading butter on your baked potato, but it's there nonetheless. The law is in everything. Butter has served as the sauce for dozens of lawsuits, statutes, and regulations that sought to protect the dairy industry and the consumer. Butter made Vermonters a good income, particularly at the beginning of the twentieth century. In 1900, Vermont butter was the most profitable cash crop in the state.[1]
At first, butter was made on the farm. Aside from home use, butter served as a medium of exchange, in times before there was money in circulation, carrying many Vermonters through hard times. It was portable, and profitable. But it was also liable to spoil. Farmers brought their butter to market once a year, after storing it in barns and cellars, and rancid butter and sharp cheese were common disappointments.[2] As market opportunities opened up, farmers understood the need to industrialize butter-making, to ensure standards for milk and the production of butter for quality and taste. The first Vermont creamery opened in 1857 in Wells, and through the rest of the nineteenth century about half of all Vermont farmers conformed to what was known as the "industrial system" of producing butter, through local creameries, often organized as cooperatives.[3]
Ivan C. Weld's A Talk to the Creamery Boys of Vermont was published in the 1908 Annual Report of the Vermont State Board of Agriculture.[4] Weld heralded the industry. "Creamery butter constitutes one of the principal agricultural products of Vermont. Its production and sale is directly responsible for a large measure of the general prosperity of the State. Furthermore, Vermont butter is a product in which every true Vermonter takes a peculiar pride and interest." But his tone changed to one of caution. The competition is so keen, particularly from the west, he said, that every butter maker must guard against "habitual carelessness. and a failure to fully realize his responsibility in the matter of cleanliness, low temperature, and prompt delivery of a perishable food product."
Creameries increased the production of milk and the success of farms. They also converted dairying into an annual industry, where previously cows were allowed to dry up in the winter. The general condition of the farm improved. Silos first became popular during the 1880's to store feed for the cows over the winter.[5]In 1899, Vermont produced twenty-two million pounds of butter in its creameries. Private farms made an additional eighteen million pounds.[6]Total milk production rose to 142 million gallons that year, from the state's 270, 197 dairy cows—nearly four times that of New Hampshire and nearly twice that of Maine.[7]
What made creameries productive were two inventions: the centrifugal separator and the Babcock Tester to measure the butterfat content in milk, invented in Sweden and first introduced in 1890 in the U.S.[8] The separator was introduced in Vermont in 1884 and used on the farm to separate whole milk into skim and cream, so that the creamery could make butter from the cream, reducing transportation costs, lowering the manufacturing costs, and improving the quality of the butter produced at the creamery.[9]St. Albans was the butter capital of the world in 1894, and its creamery was said to make 25, 000 pounds a day.[10]But the good times passed, and by 1927, annual production of butter in Vermont fell to about four million pounds.[11] It fell to competition from other states and from imitation butter.
Just how important was butter to Vermonters? One of the reasons that Alene Gilman wanted to leave Mount Ida School for Girls in Newton, Massachusetts, in 1922 was butter-related. Alene only stayed three days, and her evidence in defense of the school's attempt to collect the annual tuition from her father included testimony from Alene that "the food was cold; that for breakfast there was served cereal, muffins, and coffee, for dinner, sausage, salad, or stew. Butter was not always served. The soup was made with carrots ... "[12] It wasn't easy being away from home.
Statutory History of Butter
Consumerism was generations away, but after the Civil War, concerns about public health brought greater statutory control over the dairy industry. Dilution of milk was a crime in Vermont from 1865.[13]
A person who knowingly sells, supplies or brings to be manufactured to a butter or cheese manufactory in the state, milk diluted with water, or adulterated, or milk from which cream has been taken, or keeps back part of the milk known as "striplings;" or knowingly brings or supplies milk to a butter or cheese manufactory that is tainted or partly sour from want of care in the keeping of strainers, or vessels in which said milk is kept; or a butter or cheese manufacturer who knowing uses or directs his employees to use cream from the milk brought to said butter or cheese manufacturers, without the consent of the owners thereof, shall forfeit not more than one hundred dollars, and not less than twenty-five dollars, to be recovered in an action founded upon this statute, before a justice, in the name and for the benefit of those upon whom such fraud is committed.[14]
A more comprehensive regulatory scheme emerged in 1888, to protect the consumer and, incidentally, the creamery.[15] Fraudulent marking of butter or cheese as "creamery butter or cheese" when it wasn't manufactured at a creamery, was declared a crime. Farmers were required to label their products "private creamery, " as long as they listed their name on each package.[16] The new law also defined "standard milk" as containing "not less than twelve and one-half per cent of solids, or not less than nine and one-fourth total solids exclusive of fat, except for the months of May and June, when it shall contain not less than twelve per cent of total solids."[17] Amendments in 1894 set the standard for milk in use in all creameries at four percent butter fat content.[18] State government had entered the buttery, for the sake of the public.
Creameries had to be licensed beginning in 1906.[19] The commissioner of agriculture issued the license after reviewing and approving the articles of association and bylaws, including a list of all associates. Creameries were required to submit quarterly reports of assets, liabilities, income, and disbursements, and monthly statements of the quality of milk and cream delivered to the creamery, showing the results of tests for the number of pounds of butter f at in what was sold, including the price.[20]
State inspection of creameries began in 1910.[21] The commissioner of agriculture was ordered to inspect each creamery twice a year, and make recommendations for the correction of unsanitary conditions.[22] In 1915, the commissioner was authorized to require testing of any milk delivery, with the experiment station conducting the tests.[23] Creameries had to file a bond, the amount depending on the amount of business. Accounts due patrons were treated as first liens on the real estate of the creamery, and given priority over any subsequent mortgage or attachment.[24]
In 1917, legislation first prohibited unfair discrimination by anyone buying "milk, cream or butter fat for the purpose of manufacture or sale, who, with the intention of creating a monopoly or destroying the business of a competitor ...." Purchasing these commodities at a higher rate than is paid in a community or town "after due allowance for the difference, if any, in the grade or quality, " or transportation costs, was also proscribed.[25] That year standard milk for use in creameries and cheese factories was redefined as containing three and seven-tenths percent of butter fat, on a paying basis.[26]
Butter, like milk and cheese, was thereafter regulated for quality and price, on grounds of public health, safety, and welfare.
The 1937 act establishing a milk control board was challenged in an appeal decided in 1939 by the Vermont Supreme Court. Arthur N. Auclair had sold and delivered milk without a license, and challenged the legislation as a violation of his right to equal protection under the First and Fourteenth Amendments of the U.S. Constitution, as well as Articles 7 and 9 of the Vermont Constitution. He questioned how a law or a board of state officials could fix the price of milk without taking away his rights. Chief Justice Sherman Moulton explained why the appeal was affirmed.
The legislative finding, as expressed In the same section, that certain unfair, unjust, destructive and demoralizing trade practices carried on by producers and distributors of milk and cream are likely to result in the undermining of health regulations and standards, the dairy industry and the constant supply of these commodities, thus endangering the public health, welfare and comfort, is conclusive upon us in disposing of this cause upon the demurrer, since there is nothing on the face of the statute, or from facts from which we must take judicial notice, that it is an infringement of constitutional rights.[27]
As long as there is nothing arbitrary or discriminatory about price-fixing milk, the legislation was valid.
Creameries in Court
Farmers...
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