Mr. SLOAN. Can you quote the legal definition?

Mr. ROGERS. The Department of Agriculture, in circular No. 19, June 20, 1915, defined flour as follows: "Flour is defined to mean the clean, sound product made by bolting wheat meal," and under the regulations the word "flour" means wheat flour, without some qualifying adjectives.

Mr. SLOAN. Will the gentleman tell me where the Department of Agriculture obtained that?

Mr. ROGERS. I presume that is under the pure food and drugs act. Mr. SLOAN. That is not a congressional enactment.

Mr. ROGERS. No.

Mr. SLOAN. I do not know but what I agree with the governor. I am not sure, but I would like to ask him now. I think that this definition is pretty nearly a fair one, and I thought we were interested in corn and wheat, and we will at least abide by it until we see differently. Would you have any objection to the bill if it read as follows, based upon this definition: "Providing that the words 'mixed flour' shall be taken and construed to mean a food product resulting from the grinding or mixing together of wheat flour and corn flour with any other grain or the product of any other grain "? Mr. LIND. Well, I would, for the reason, in the first place, the mixed product-there is, in my judgment, properly and correctly no such thing as corn flour. When you and I were boys we never heard the term corn flour."

Mr. HILL. Rye flour?

Mr. LIND. Rye flour, barley flour, and wheat flour, but never corn flour or oat flour. It is oat meal and corn meal and rye flour and barley flour and wheat flour.

Mr. SLOAN. But that was for the reason, was it not, that the fine mashing systems had been applied to the wheat product but had not been applied to the oats or the corn?

Mr. LIND. Corn meal, when used as corn meal, naturally can not be bolted to any great extent, but ground fine, if you bolt it. you get the starch and the dust, and that will not respond to any sort of rising. It will respond to neither chemicals nor yeast.

Mr. SLOAN. But it would be wholesome, would it not?

Mr. LIND. It is wholesome.

Mr. SLOAN. Then, if the corn itself is thoroughly ground and mixed with the wheat flour, you would be intermingling two flours that would come under the statement "thoroughly," would you not"thoroughly mixed flour"?

Mr. LIND. Practically that never will be done.

Mr. SLOAN. I know; but it would. We do not know what the ingenuity of the American millers would accomplish.

Mr. LIND. It would be a new form of flour, which does not exist. The existing law is erroneous in one respect that one respect that is, judg ing it from the basis of the pure-food act-because it calls a mixture of starch and flour, and justifies the calling of a mixture of starch and flour, "mixed flour." It is not a mixed flour; it is a mixed cereal.

Mr. SLOAN. That is the present law, and not the proposed law. Mr. LIND. Yes. If the committee were to determine to pass this bill and wanted to be accurate about it, then it would say "mixed

cereals" and not "mixed flour." It would define mixed cereals and give the regulations.

The CHAIRMAN. How is this definition; does it meet with your approval: "Mixed flour shall be taken and considered to mean a food product resulting from the mixing together of wheat or wheat flour with any other wheat or with the product of any other wheat "? Mr. LIND. That is in effect what you have now. Starch is a product of wheat.

The CHAIRMAN. That is exactly what we have now. Then, you are opposed to the present definition, are you?

Mr. LIND. That is what you have in the pending bill.

The CHAIRMAN. And also that is the law.

Mr. LIND. Yes; that is in the proposed law.

The CHAIRMAN. That has been the definition of mixed flour for 18 years. Do you object to the proposed legislation when we define it just as you want it-do we not?

Mr. LIND. We are willing to stand on the law as it is now.

The CHAIRMAN. We define it the same way in this bill; not a particle of difference.

Mr. LIND. The definition, coupled with the tax, effects the object, although the definition itself is bad; but if you are going to drop the tax, do not retain the bad definition.

The CHAIRMAN. You would not want the tax retained as a revenue measure at all, but simply because of the odium it places on this food product, although the product is wholesome in itself.

Mr. LIND. Put it that way if you like. I do not object personally. The CHAIRMAN. I know you would not, because that is exactly what your argument reaches.

Mr. LIND. Certainly I do not object to putting it in that language. The CHAIRMAN. That is simply what you have proven so far by your position.

Mr. LIND. Yes; it is primarily that.

The CHAIRMAN. I am under obligations, at least, to you for being so frank in the matter. You say if this product goes on the market under the heading of mixed flour it would be a misnomer?

Mr. LIND. I do.

The CHAIRMAN. And yet it goes on the market now, and has for 18 years, under the heading of "mixed flour."

Mr. LIND. But we have not been hurt by the misnomer.

The CHAIRMAN. So you want to put an odium on it and spoil a business.

Mr. LIND. You see, we have wheat millers and corn millers, and they have been dealing in this business since 1898 down to the present time-yes, sir; and before.

Mr. E. M. KELLY, of Nashville, Tenn. We have been grinding 8,000 bushels of corn a day. We have not done

Mr. HASKELL. I would like to ask that gentleman a question. How much corn are you grinding now a day?

Mr. KELLY. We are not grinding it at all. We have for the last 20 odd years until this year. Our capacity is about 8,800 bushels a day.

Mr. HASKELL. The point that I wanted to bring out is that he is not grinding corn now.

Mr. SLOAN. What is the particular point in that?

Mr. HASKELL. He is brought here as a witness to the fact that he is grinding corn, and I wanted to show that he is not.

Mr. SLOAN. What is the particular point, if he is not engaged in it now?

Mr. HASKELL. He is not a corn miller. He can not come here as a witness to testify as a corn miller.

Mr. FORDNEY. He has just reformed in the last year.

Mr. SLOAN. You mean that there is no such thing as corn flour? Mr. LIND. I do.

Mr. SLOAN. This flour that is submitted here you claim is a byproduct of a chemical process?

Mr. LIND. No, no; not chemical; not in that case. He is evidently a grit miller, and makes other corn products and corn meal.

Mr. SLOAN. You claim that there is no such thing as corn flour; that there is rye flour and buckwheat flour and wheat flour? Mr. LIND. Yes, sir.

Mr. ALLEN. Is the corn flour-so called, at any rate-made from ordinary corn, or is it the heart of some part of the ordinary Indian corn, the field corn?

Mr. LIND. All corn carries starch, and the cornstarch is called corn flour generally, except that there is a small quantity produced by millers, like the gentleman testified just before I spoke. He produces what they call corn flour, but that is really a by-product, the dust eliminated, and it comes out of the break of the corn berry. Mr. LONGWORTH. Is that this substance that he spoke of?

Mr. LIND. Yes. It may be a meal-a fine meal or it may be a commercial corn flour.

Mr. HILL. You do not say that it is not possible to make a corn flour, do you?

Mr. LIND. If by corn flour you mean only a finely pulverized cereal product, of course, it is not impossible.

Mr. J. H. GENUNG. I would like to correct that, if you please. The product I showed you here is made from grits products. We make 80,000 pounds of it a day at one mill.

The CHAIRMAN. Is it a by-product at all?

Mr. GENUNG. Not at all. We manufacture thousands and thousands and thousands of bags as a corn flour and ship it abroad. It is not a dust at all. It is grits, ground down into corn flour. If you lived South, you would understand what grits is.

Mr. LIND. Certainly that can be done.

Mr. GENUNG. Certainly. Thousands and thousands and thousands of bags of it are shipped abroad every year as corn flour.

Mr. LIND. How long have you used the commercial name of corn flour?

Mr. GENUNG. Since I have been connected with the businessprobably 20 years. That is as far back as I can go.

Mr. LIND. Mr. Chairman, I have personal knowledge of this matter, derived in this way: There was a hearing before the Interstate Commerce Commission in which rates were involved and the cornproduce people produced their experts, their chemists, and described in detail the processes by which the corn products were manufactured, including the starch, and in their brief submitted, and in the decision of the Interstate Commerce Commission which I will cite

you the whole process of manufacture is described, and it is from that and my general knowledge of food mixture.

The CHAIRMAN. Now, from your knowledge of food mixture, can you do as much work and make as much bread on a starch food as you can on any other kind?

Mr. LIND. Absolutely.

The CHAIRMAN. Isn't it true that starch furnishes more energy than any other product?

Mr. LIND. I grant that it is the starch that furnishes all the energy, and if you get the starch in its concentrated form, as for instance, whisky, it furnishes it very rapidly.

The CHAIRMAN. That is a poison.

Mr. LIND. Not at all.

The CHAIRMAN. Whisky is not?

Mr. LIND. I do not think so. What I mean is this: Starch in any form, whether it be any form of alcohol or the plain starch, produces energy. It is the fuel. It is the fuel which produces the heat of the body, but it does not restore a tissue or muscle, and no one would contend that here.

The CHAIRMAN. A man would have a hard time living to be a very old man without starches.

Mr. LIND. Certainly.

The CHAIRMAN. You are not against it because it is starch?

Mr. LIND. No, sir; but there is such a thing as too much starch. We have nature's proper allowance of starch in the staff of life.

Hon. GEORGE R. SMITH, Minneapolis, Minn. May it please the chairman, I would like to ask the indulgence of the committee to hear Mr. Hamilton, the president of the New York State Millers' Association, for a moment. He has to return to New York, and he can not remain, for it is impossible for him to remain. He supposed that he could be through here to-day. It is Mr. Hamilton, president of the New York State Millers' Association.

STATEMENT OF MR. WILLIAM V. HAMILTON, PRESIDENT NEW YORK STATE MILLERS' ASSOCIATION, CALEDONIA, N. Y.

Mr. HAMILTON. I thank you, Mr. Chairman, for the privilege of appearing here to-day, as I am very desirous of returning home this afternoon. I represent, as president, the New York State Millers' Association, and I will say that I am engaged in the business of wheat-flour milling. For about a year I have been president of the New York State Millers' Association, an organization composed of wheat-flour millers, whose combined capacity is approximately 40,000 barrels of wheat flour per day.

I am here to protest on my own behalf and on behalf of the New York State Millers' Association against the repeal of the present mixed-flour law or any change or modification in that law.

The sentiment of our members is that previous to 1898 the flourmilling trade was demoralized as a result of a general practice of adulterating wheat flour. Since the mixed-wheat flour law was enacted, this abuse has been absolutely corrected and adulterated wheat flour driven from the market, making competition fair for the miller, and at the same time protecting the consumer. We attribute the im proved conditions to the operation of the mixed-flour law under the

Bureau of Internal Revenue, Department of the Treasury, and we are opposed to the repeal of this measure of acknowledged efficiency and the substitution therefor of a measure that would be, in our opinion, an experiment.

STATEMENT OF THOMAS E. LANNEN-Continued.

Mr. LANNEN. Mr. Chairman, I want to distribute around to the committee some of this cornstarch. I also want to give you some bread.

The CHAIRMAN. Which of these two loaves that you sent up hereone is No. 2 and one is No. 3-is made out of pure wheat?

Mr. LANNEN. No. 2 contains 20 per cent cornstarch and No. 3 contains flour only. Otherwise the loaves are exactly the same, except a slight variation in moisture.

Mr. MOORE. Is this the same substance that Gov. Lind referred to as representing the nutrition?

Mr. LANNEN. Yes, sir.

Mr. MOORE. And the 20 per cent of cornstarch enters into this loaf of bread [indicating]?

Mr. LANNEN. Yes, sir. Now, the reason why I handed to you the boxes of cornstarch was in order that I might show you something that every housewife and every child in this country is familiar with in those packages. It is all right to juggle language. It is all right to call attention to things in the abstract; but once you see a thing that you have known from childhood and are familiar with it, then you know what you are talking about. Some of those packages have been on the market, labeled that way, for many, many years, and I doubt if there is a wife in the United States who would not recognize those packages clear across the room and know what is in them. We are talking about cornstarch, a product that we have all eaten in the form of pudding, a product that is fed to children, to invalids, and recommended by dietitians all the time and everywhere. It seems to me, gentlemen, that it is a waste of time for me to stand up here and defend cornstarch. Gov. Lind has relieved me of that necessity by saying that it is a perfectly good, wholesome food. I take it that the opponents of this bill, therefore, will not contest

Mr. MOORE (interposing). I do not recall any statement of that kind at all, either as to cornstarch or as to corn flour, legitimate corn products. The question has been raised as to sulphuric acid and one or two other mineral compounds that were apparently used and discussed when this law was passed in 1898.

Mr. LANNEN. I understand that Gov. Lind said here that this cornstarch was manufactured by sulphuric acid.

Mr. MOORE. He cut that out. I think I remember his correcting that.

Mr. LIND. Might I say one word?

Mr. MOORE. My recollection is that you excepted that.

Mr. LIND. I said as long as sulphuric acid is used in the process, but if it is properly used it does not do any hurt.

Mr. LANNEN. Why not mention it?

Mr. LIND. Because it is not always properly eliminated.

Mr. LANNEN. We have expert starch manufacturers here who are perfectly qualified to testify as to the manufacture of starch. They