Theodore Roosevelt often spoke of fighting a war against “the evils of the day.”
During his presidency, Roosevelt was very active in arguing for laws and policies to
benefit public health. After reading Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle, which documented
the terrible conditions of the meatpacking industry, Roosevelt invited the author to
the White House. During a meeting with Sinclair, Roosevelt promised to use federal regulations
to clean up the sickening conditions inside meatpacking plants.
Roosevelt was not the only one disgusted by what he read in Sinclair’s novel. Upon the
release of the book, there was large-scale public outcry for government intervention.
Roosevelt responded by appointing a commission to investigate. The commission reported back,
and their findings confirmed most of Sinclair’s accounts.
Armed with a mandate from the American people and the information included in the report,
Roosevelt pushed for the Meat Inspection Act to be passed by Congress. The bill called
for stricter sanitary requirements for meatpackers as well as a government program to carry out
inspections of the plants. The government had to pay for the inspections, but packers
were required to label canned goods with information that included the date the food was processed.
Roosevelt also sought changes in other food areas, as well as drug manufacturing. Both
areas remained largely unregulated, and many manufacturers were adding dangerous preservatives
to food in order to extend shelf life. Across the country, drug manufacturers sold medications
in boxes and containers which claimed to cure cancer, baldness, and a wide variety of other
conditions and ailments. The large variety of items sold in drug stores,
and from the suitcases of travelling salesmen, did not have to be labeled. Anyone who purchased
one of these products had no way of knowing what the contents of the medication were.
Many popular children’s medicines of the day contained alcohol, cocaine, or heroin.
The exploitation of the American people by these “snake oil” salesmen enraged Roosevelt,
and he vowed to use the power of his office to put a stop to it.
With Roosevelt’s encouragement, Congress responded with the passage of the Pure Food
and Drug Act. The law put a halt to the sale of contaminated medicines and food. While
it did not ban the sale of harmful products, it required a list of active ingredients to
be placed on packaging labels and that drugs could not fall below purity levels established
by the government. The Pure Food and Drug Act and the Meat Inspection
Act were key pieces of Progressive Era legislation. They were the first in a series of important consumer
protection laws which eventually led to the creation of the Food and Drug Administration.
Both acts were signed into law by President Theodore Roosevelt on June 30, 1906.
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