RESIGNATION

On March 15, 1912, having been convinced that it was useless for me to remain any longer as a Chief of the Bureau which had been deprived of practically all its authority under the law, I resigned.

Letter of Resignation of Dr. H. W. Wiley March 15, 1912.

In retiring from this position after so many years of service it seems befitting that I should state briefly the causes which have led me to this step. Without going into detail respecting these causes, I desire to say that the fundamental one is that I believe I can find opportunity for better and more effective service to the work which is nearest my heart, namely, the pure food and drug propaganda, as a private citizen than I could any longer find in my late position.

In this action I do not intend in any way to reflect upon the position which has been taken by my superior officers in regard to the same problems. I accord to them the same right to act in accordance with their convictions which I claim for myself.

After a quarter of a century of constant discussion and effort the bill regulating interstate and foreign commerce in foods and drugs was enacted into law. Almost from the very beginning of the enforcement of this act I discovered that my point of view in regard to it was fundamentally different from that of my superiors in office. For nearly six years there has been a growing feeling in my mind that these differences were irreconcilable and I have been conscious of an official environment which has been essentially inhospitable. I saw the fundamental principles of the food and drugs act, as they appeared to me, one by one paralyzed or discredited.

It was the plain provision of the act, and was fully understood at the time of the enactment, as stated in the law itself, that the Bureau of Chemistry was to examine all samples of suspected foods and drugs to determine whether they were adulterated or misbranded and that if this examination disclosed such facts the matter was to be referred to the courts for decision. Interest after interest, engaged in what the Bureau of Chemistry found to be the manufacture of misbranded or adulterated foods and drugs, made an appeal to escape appearing in court to defend their prac tices. Various methods were employed to secure this end, many of which were successful.

One by one I found that the activities pertaining to the Bureau of Chemistry were restricted and various forms of manipulated food products were withdrawn from its consideration and referred either to other bodies not contemplated by the law or directly relieved from further control. A few of the instances of this kind are well known. Among these may be mentioned the manufacture of so-called whisky from alcohol, colors and flavors; the addition to food products of benzoic acid and its salts, of sulphurous acid and its salts, of sulphate of copper, of saccharin and of alum; the manufacture of so-called wines from pomace, chemicals and colors; the floating of oysters often in polluted waters for the purpose of making them look fatter and larger than they really are for the purposes of sale; the selling of mouldy, fermented, decomposed and misbranded grains; the offering to the people of glucose under the name of "corn sirup," thus taking a name which rightfully belongs to another product made directly from Indian corn stalks.

The official toleration and validation of such practices have restricted the activities of the Bureau of Chemistry to a very narrow field. As a result of these restrictions I have been instructed to refrain from stating in any public way my own opinion regarding the effect of these substances upon health, and this restriction has interfered with my academic freedom of speech on matters relating directly to the public welfare.

These restrictions culminated in the summer of 1911 with false charges of misconduct made against me by my colleagues in the Department of Agriculture, which had it not been for the prompt interference on the part of the President of the United States (William Howard Taft), to whom I am profoundly grateful, would have led to my forcible separation from the public service. After the President of the United States and a committee of Congress, as a result of a searching investigation, had completely exonerated me from any wrong doing in this matter, I naturally expected that those who had made these false charges against me would no longer be continued in a position which would make a repetition of such an action possible. The event, however, has not sustained my expectations in this matter. I was still left to come into daily contact with men who secretly plotted my destruction.

I am now convinced that the freedom which belongs to every private American citizen can be used by me more fruitfully in rallying public opinion to the support of the cause of pure food and drugs than could the limited activity left to me in the position which I have just vacated. I propose to devote the remainder of my life, with such ability as I have at my command and with such opportunities as may arise, to the promotion of the principles of civic righteousness and industrial integrity which underlie the food and drugs act, in the hope that it may be administered in the interest of the people at large, instead of that of a comparatively few mercenary manufacturers and dealers.

This hope is heightened by my belief that a great majority of manufacturers and dealers in foods and drugs are heartily in sympathy with the views I have held, and that these views are endorsed by an overwhelming majority of the press and of the citizens of the country.

In severing my official relations with the Secretary of Agriculture I take this opportunity of thanking him for the personal kindness and regard which he has shown me during his long connection with the department.

In a supplemental statement to Secretary Wilson Dr. Wiley says:

In transferring the management of the Bureau of Chemistry to other hands I desire to direct your attention to a few matters in which I think you will be interested.

I have always been a believer in the civil service law and have endeavored to carry out both its spirit and its letter. For this reason I have strongly opposed, except in cases of extreme necessity, the appointment of any person in the bureau not secured from the civil service register.

It is also a matter of extreme gratification to me that in the twenty-nine years which I have been chief of this bureau to my knowledge there has never been a cent wrongfully expended and no officer or employe of this bureau has ever been accused of misappropriation of public funds.

Those whose memories carry them back As far as 1912 will recall that the resignation of the Chief of the Bureau of Chemistry created quite a commotion. Not only were the newspapers and magazines full of references thereto, but the caricaturists took up the fight. One of these cartoons in the Rocky Mountain News depicted Uncle Sam bidding adieu to the departing Chief of the Bureau. Another striking cartoon depicted Uncle Sam measuring the shoes of the departed chief. Among the hundreds of editorial comments perhaps the most interesting are those made also by the Rocky Mountain News., under the caption "The Borgias of Business."

"If the people exhibited the same persistence in looking after their interests that Illegitimate Business displays in looking after its interests, the things of which we complain would soon be brought to an end, and prosperity, like a tidal wave, would flood the land.

"For twenty years at least, the food poisoners of the country have waged warfare on Dr. Harvey W. Wiley, and since the passage of the Pure Food act in 1906 they have trebled efforts to have him discharged. These Borgias of business have won, for the circumstances attending Dr. Wiley's recent resignation make it, in practical effect, a dismissal.

"Dr. Wiley resigned because the fundamental principles of the Pure Food law have been strangled; because he has been powerless to punish the manufacturers of misbranded and adulterated drugs and foods; and because the powers of his position had been nullified by executive orders. * * *

"Dr. Wiley was only head of the Bureau of Chemistry, but there is every reason to believe that President Taft will find that Dr. Wiley gave the position an importance out of all proportion to its standing."

--From the Rocky Mountain News, March 21, 1912.

Cartoon by Berryman, from the Washington Star