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QUARANTINE AND COMMERCE.
How to Enforce the one without Detriment to the other.
PRESIDENT Holt's REMARKS BEFoRE THE REPRE-
SENTATIVES OF THE EXCHANGES.
The forty days’ quarantine has created considerable opposi-
tion among the merchants and business men. The first body
to take organized action was the Produce Exchange.
In pursuance to the call of the required number of members,
l?resident E. K. Converse called a general meeting for 1 o'clock
yesterday afternoon. The other exchanges and commercial
bodies were invited to attend, and representatives of nearly
all were present. Capt. T. J. Woodward, reprensented the
Maritime Association, Jno. W. Adams, Philip Orr and Charles
Garvey the Mechanics', Dealers' and Lumbermen’s Exchange
Marshall J. Smith, John Poitevant, Pearl Wight, T. Adam
Clayton, A. Samuels and Joseph A. Baldwin the Mexican
Exchange, and W. M. Burwell the Chamber of Commerce.
There was a large number of the members of the Produce
Exchange in attendance. - - - -
Dr. Joseph Holt, President of the Board of Health, accepted
an invitation to address the meeting, and Dr. Faget, of the
board, was also present, i -
President Converse called the meeting to order shortly after
1 o'clock and explained its objects. He said that after Dr.
Holt spoke any other persons present would be allowed to dis-
cuss matters before the body.
Dr. Holt said that he had been informed at a late hour of
the invitation to speak, and was at a loss to know the particu-
lar points of inquiry, but would answer any questions put
to him,
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*
President Converse whispered what the meeting desired to
know and Dr. Holt proceeded to explain the present system of
quarantine, displaying exactly how much it was a Quarantine
against importing yellow fever and against commerce. He
said he would also speak of the change proposed, dictated by
intelligence and indorsed by science.
He commenced as follows:– - -
Gentlemen—It has been recognized from the earliest periods
of medieval history that certain diseases, at that time the
plague, were transmissible, and to prevent importation, as
early as 1484 quarantine, a detention of forty days, was deter-
mined upon. This method of prevention was continued
throughout the dark ages, but as modern enlightenment ad-
Vanced, the crude idea of detention was replaced by scientific
methods which mitigated the rigor and burden of the ancient
system. The history of quarantine in Louisiana tells us that
in the year 1820 Gov. Villeré, impressed by the necessity of
preventing the frequent recurrence of yellow fever epidemics
which had swept this city successive years previously, urged
the establishment of a system of rigorous quarantine as the
only preventive of pestilential disaster. In February, 1821,
the Legislature passed an act establishing a board of health
with plenary power, pecuniary, legislative, executive, judi-
cial and a system of quarantine subject to its control to be
enforced with the extremist vigor.
The year 1821 passed by without the appearance of yellow
fever. In January, 1822, Gov. Robertson issued a proclamation
of congratulation and thanksgiving that the city had been
spared through the intervention of a wise measure of quaran-
time. A congratulation that at last there had been discovered
an efficient and sure preventive of the recurrence of yellow
fever. This was hailed with public demonstrations of delight.
In August following, while the quarantine was operative in
its extremest exaction, yellow fever suddenly made its appear-
- ance, and a fearful epidemic devastated the city. The 23d of
January following, at a great public meeting, the absolute
inefficiency of quarantine was declared; that while utterly
useless as a preyentive against yellow fever, it was destructive
3
to commerce. The Legislature was petitioned to repeal quar.
antine laws and to abolish the Board of Health.
In 1825 the Legislature, having satisfied itself that in the
experiment of quarantine yellow fever had appeared twice -
epidemically out of three years, abolished the quarantine and
sold the lands appropriated to its use. -
The present system of quarantine, gentlemen, is simply a
re-enactment and a continuation of the quarantine system of
1821, a system whose only feature of reliance is identical with
that of the Venetian, a system of lengthy detention. . . .
Let us now examine this question and determine in how far
this system of quarantine is a quarantine against the importa-
tion of pestilence and against the importation of the commo-
dities of commerce. I present you here an exhibit of the
prevalence of yellow fever in New Orleans during the last
fifteen years, our quarantine prevailing all the while. This is
particularly interesting to those who maintain that yellow fe-
wer can appear here only as immediately imported.
Years. Cases. Deaths.
1869. . . . . . . . . . • - - - - - - - - - - - - - - is in 4 + · + · is a s tº e = 9 3
1870. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .--- ---.......... ... ... 587
1871. . . . . . * * * - * = * * = * * * * * * * * *- * * * * * * * * * * . 114 54
1872 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . * * * * * * * * * * * * * * ... 83 39
1873. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ----------. 288 226
1874 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . … --- 20 11
1875. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . * * * * * * * = . . . . . . . . 100 61
1876. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ...... 83. 42
1877 . . . . . tº e º 'º - tº e = s. m . e. g. * * * * * * * * * * . . . . . . . . . . 1 1
1878...... . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .-------........ … 4046
1879 . . . .................................. 48 19
1880 ..................... ... ............... 2
1881. . . . . * - tº tº m is is º + º- ºr sº º 'º. * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * a is --
1882 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ... 4
1883 ...... ... .….......... . . . . . . . . "I
Total.............................. 5096
*The death on the 7th of November, 1883, occurred after quarantine had ceased.
For the sake of those who insist upon the necessary impor.







4.
tation of this disease and who deny its origin, except as im-
mediately imported, I present these figures as extremely inter-
esting and, as to our system of quarantine, finally convincing.
Here is a failure twelve times out of a possible fifteen. If our
quarantine system were a man at a shooting match and he
were to make such a score his gun would be taken from him
and he would be driven ignominiously from the field.
As a simple matter of truth I know that three of these ap-
pearances of yellow fever were of local origin. However, I
am perfectly willing to credit them to the quarantine system
of strict importationists.
As straws show the direction of the wind, let us briefly cite
a few instances of the effect of our quarantine upon com-
merce. .
Dr. Holt then read the following table: -
Imports of coffee to New Orleans from all sources during the
years: 1859, 408,396 bags; 1870, 139,742 bags; 1880, 249,674
bags; 1883, 260,145 bags. -
In 1859, New Orleans received about one-half the total im-
port of coffee grown in the Western Hemisphere—in 1883, a
little less than one-tenth. -
Exports to the Island of Cuba :
Bacon, Lard, Corn,
- Casks. tierces. bushels.
1859. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2,130 20,890 ------
1870. . . . . . . . . . . . . . • * * * * * * * 707 4,063 124,147
1880. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 200 156,144
1883........ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20 369 48,636
This table is a feeble and most imperfect exposition of the
magnitude of our commercial loss. The aggregate amounts
to millions and millions of dollars. -
What is the effect upon New Orleans as the centre of a cir-
cle of commerce? It is brought down from a centre and placed
on the Southern edge, a line drawn across its field of com-
merce, the Tropic of Cancer. " . -
The great ports of the Atlantic Coast are bidding high for
all the Mexican, Central American, West Indian and South


5
American trade. The cities of St. Louis, Cincinnati, Chicago,
the great trans-continental lines, perceiving the embarrass-
ment of our Gulf ports, have boldly projected their grand in-
ternational lines into the heart of Mexico. We are flanked
by competition on the East, by competition on the West, suc-
cessful competition; while New Orleans is stranded high and
dry upon a sand-bar of quarantine. -
A physical bar obstructing the mouth of the Mississippi
presented itself for years as a formidable obstacle to the com-
merce of the Mississippi. The genius of Eads displayed be-
fore Congress a plan whereby this bar could be jettied and an
opening made to the commerce of the world, Congress, upon
mere faith in his plans, appropriated subject to his call,
$5,000,000, and to-day the mouth of the Mississippi is at all
seasons open to the heaviest tonnage of the maritime world.
But now that the genius of man has overcome this physical
bar, our commerce is confronted by a legal bar more obstruc.
tive, more insuperable than a physical detention.
Of what use is the removal of a sand-bar of uncertain
obstruction, where there remains one imposed by law more
obdurate than rock # -
The necessities of our very existence as a commercial people
demand that we shall jetty our quarantine and limit it to a
sharp, narrow channel, obstructive to importation of pesti-
lenee, but open as a highway to commerce.
What is the effect upon the laboring classes of this commu-
nity and the vast multitude of our people who derive their
daily subsistence from the works of commerce? The steve-
dores, the longshoremen, the draymen, that immense body of
handlers of imported and exported goods are compelled to eke
out, during a long term of summer idleness, the scanty means
garnered during a few months of hard winter's work. Often
the extremest pangs of poverty are endured by tender women
and children, whose supporters, courageous in heart and will-
ing to work, have not the employment to earn their daily
bread. The one who goes his daily round as the physician
among the honest laboring classes of New Orleans, and wit.
nesses the evidence of pinching want among a people proud,
6
bold and willing, anxious to work, is enough to move a man
of callous heart even to tears.
Enforced idleness means not only penury, anxiety, hunger
and wretchedness, but is also an irresistible agent of slothful-
ness, drunkenness and crime.
The arch-enemy of man can inflict no deadlier injury than
idleness. The grandest philanthropy can confer no greater
beneficence than honest labor. -
While I realize the necessities of our merchants and capital.
ists, my sympathies and my chief anxieties are for the great
mass of our laboring people. - * . .
Moved by the inclinations of my heart, I stand before you,
to-day, in the cause of the great rank and file of our people
who earn their daily bread by their daily toil.
Mr. Lesseps, the shrewdest commercial caleulator of the
world, has assured us that the Panama Canal will be opened
four months anterior to 1888. He has declared also that
6,000,000 of tons will pass either way through this canal the
first year. The Tehuantepec railway will be opened to trade.
The great tide of commerce will presently pass into the Gulf
of Mexico. Its inatural direction will be toward the interior
of this continent. -
It is a law of commerce as of fluids, that it follows the
course of least resistance. What must this be to the city of
New Orleans, when opposed by a systematic quarantine of ten
days?. A quarantine of ten days as effectually destroys com-
merce eventually as non-intercourse. The only difference is
one of a force slowly or quickly applied. •º -
How shall we jetty this formidable obstacle to the prosperity
of New Orleans, to the availability of the Mississippi * Here,
gentlemen, is a plan which has been worked out under the
eyes of the ablest shipbuilders, masters of vessels and men
experienced in all the affairs appertaining to the sanitation of
a ship.
It is impossible for me here to present a detailed account of
- this new quarantine system. I will present you simply an
abstract, taken from my address recently delivered before the
Conference of Boards of Health of the Gulf States and of


7
Tennessee. Allow me here to state that this plan has been
endorsed by the representatives of these States and by others,
most competent as authorities: -
When a vessel arrives at the mouth of the Mississippi, she
is either infected or she is healthy. If we know her to be
infected, she is at once removed to the supplemental or lower
station, for infected vessels only, where she will be actually
cleansed, actually disinfected and fumigated, her sick removed
to the local hospital. - - -
She is an exceptional case, and will be dealt with excep-
tionally. -
She will certainly not be allowed to endanger healthy vessels
by mooring hi their vicinity. -
If at any time she wishes to put back to sea, she is at liberty
to do so; but if she desires to come to our port, she will be de-
tained until the board can safely venture upon allowing her
up. -
We will understand better the particulars of treatment when
we have described the course of a sailing ship through quaran-
time—no record of sickness on the voyage; a cargo of 30,000 bags
of coffee; yellow fever epidemic in Rio, from whence she has
cleared. She is brought alongside the wharf at the upper Quar.
antine Station, where she finds every arrangement for the rapid
discharging and reloading of cargo. The crew with all their
effects, is at once taken ashore, where, in a room provided,
everything they carry, apparel and baggage, is subjected to
powerful disinfection. Their clothing exchanged for other
clothing already treated, and this, in turn, disinfected. They
are then received at a commodious boarding house, comfort—
ably prepared for them, there to undergo the prescribed deten.
tion. If one should fall ill, he is instantly removed to the
hospital as distant as can be located. . .
Hospital experience proves that yellow fever is conveyed
through the medium, not of persons, but of things. Yellow
fever has never invaded the Charity Hospital except in the reg-
ular march of an epidemic. In the meantime a full corps of ac. .
climated stevedores are busily engaged in breaking out the
cargo and transferring it to the warehouse, already built by the

8
United States Government for that accommodation, or directly
into barges, there to undergo fumigation. As soon as com-
pletely emptied, or at least sufficiently so to permit of thorough
cleansing and fumigation, the quarantine tug, a compactly built
small vessel somewhat after the fashion of a fire tug for harbor
protection, is run alongside the ship. A hose attached to a
powerful forcing pump aboard the tug, is let through the for-
ward hatchway down into the hold. - -
In order to flush the bilge quickly, it might be necessary to
take up the limber plank, as a better examination could be had
and the real condition ascertained. But whether this is done
or not, or the ship be in ballast or not, she can be speedily and
thoroughly washed. The pump is started and the washing be-
gins while the ship's pumps are set to discharging the foul
bilgewater. This continues until she is washed clean, not only
in the limbers and floors of the hold, but the ceiling and every.
available part. She is now pumped out, the hose removed, and
then begins the disinfection and fumigation. Another large
hose attached to a powerful exhaust fan is lowered into the
same position as the first. The hatches and every other outlet
are closely battened, with the exception of a small ventilating
hatch way, either at the bow or stern. A quantity of sulphur
is put into the furnace connected with the fan, and ignited.
The exhaust fan is started and sulphuric acid gas in immense
volume and with tremendous force is driven into the limbers
and air-stakes, into every crevice and part of that ship until
she is completely filled. We go through her with an atmos-
phere, as it were of fire. - - - -
In doing this we displace the mephitic and dangerous at-
mosphere closed in her when she started from Rio, and which,
if allowed, would have been set free at our levee—the infected
atmosphere of Rio to commingle with the atmosphere of New
Orleans, deadly ripe, perhaps, for its reception.
We have displaced this not only with a non-infected atmos.
phere, but with one intensely germicidal—one that destroys or.
ganic elements in the air, or on exposed surfaces, with instant
greediness. As for the fumigating agent to be selected, we may
use through this apparatus sulphurous acid gas, chlorine, or the
9
mitric acid fumes, produced by pouring nitric acid upon copper
filings, of which Dr. Wiblin, of Southampton, says that all the
goods may be safely and satisfactorily disinfected by this
agent. The fumes so produced are so powerful that no
animaculae can exist in them for more than two seconds, and
the portholes being closed for twelve hours, the process can-
not fail to be effective. For my own part, I believe that the
sulphurous acid is all that we can desire. . -
After a few hours the hatches are removed and pure air is
driven in to facilitate clearing the ship of the fumes. She is
reloaded, or her freight already sent by barge, and with her
captain on board, proceeds at once to the city there to be dis-
charged only by an acclimated gang. Her export freights
must be ready. She is at once reloaded and starts on her
voyage. If the term of detention of her crew has not already
expired, she touches at Quarantine to take on such as have
engaged to reship, and puts to sea, with no more detention
than was required to cleanse her, with the utmost expedition,
which alone was worth the trouble.
This method having once been enforced we may boldly
proclaim that for the first time in the history of our quarantine
a ship has been actually cleansed and disinfected, purged of
her suspicion. - -
There remains no cause of accusation. Let her go free and
land her boldly along these wharves
: The time of detention will depend upon the time in unloading
the vessel.
The crew will be cared for comfortably and kept under sur-
veillance. There will be classes, some crews being kept longer
than others. -
A vessel can be treated in this manner easily. It only re-
quires proper appliances. With such a system the people can
be told that they will be given a quarantine which at least will
not interrupt commerce. This system promises a higher guar-
antee against importation; but as the fever is liable to gener-
ate right here the board cannot guarantee that it will keep
out the disease.

10
Sir Sherston Baker, one of the ablest writers on interna-
- tional law, and undoubtedly the highest legal authority on
quarantine, has declared that in practice the ideal in quarantine
can never be attained: that absolutely isolation of a commu-
nity is only practicable in a very restricted degree.
“A quarantine of long duration formerly constituted a prac.
tical method of protection, and was well suited to the slow and
tardy commerce of the time. - Complicated by all sorts of use-
less and barbarous processes, a long quarantine has, now-a-
days become a worthy object of criticism, and being moreover
found to be a serious obstacle to the spirit of mercantile ad-
venture, which has been increasing more and more, it has by
degrees become obsolete, and has been replaced by milder
regulations.” - -
“In practice, quarantine measures, be they what they may,
can never give an absolute guarantee of safety; nevertheless
they diminish more or less, according to the circumstances
under which they are applied, and according to the vigor of
the treatment with which they are enforced, the chances of
an importation of infectious disease ; in other words, quarantine
can only give a relative guaranteed. - -
Must the conclusion then be as some would have it, that quar-
time is useless % Must preventive measures be suppressed
because they cannot close every path against an importable
and easily propagated infection ?
Such is not however, the general experience of mankind,
who, although aiming at perfecton, are necessarily often con-
tent with a modicum of success. Shall we abolish the fire
brigade because a row of houses are burnt down Shall we
dismiss the police force because a dozen burglaries have
occurred ? Shall we denounce the system of railway sig.
nalling becauce a false signal has caused a fatal catastrophe
In practice we must necessarily be content with the best relative
certainty. In all cases it is sufficient for us if the means of pre-
yention employed increase, in some reasonable degree, the

If
chances of preservation and safety, and in such cases we consider
those means of preservation advisable and worthy of adoption.
Although quarantine does not constitute a certain means of
preservation, it affords a probability more or less great of
preservation.
Quarantine necessarily occasions a certain annoyance to
those engaged in commerce and in shipping—two important
interests clash together, viz: those of public health and those
of commerce—it becomes the problem of every State to deter.
mine on the happy mean in which quarantine may become
advantageous for the interests of all, that is to say, that the
benefits to be expected from a quarantine system should be
commensurate with the burden which the system imposes.
Every State experiences the difficulty of conciliating these two
antagonistic interests.
The laws of the United Kingdom are well calculated to meet
all contingencies of disease, and to protect the sanitary inter-
ests of the Kingdom with the least practicable restraint on
Commerce.” -
In reply to a question as to the use of quarantining the
rivers and not the railroads equally, and as to the practicabil-
ity of the latter, Dr. Holt declared that passengers from dis-
tant points of infection could reach by rail this or any other
city through the best quarantine we might establish; but, as
# Il offset, the danger was infinitely less. That quarantine,
even the most perfect, offered only a relative assurance of
safety. . . . . . . -
“Under no conditions, now or in the future, will this Board
of Health offer any assurance further than a faithful perform-
ance of duty. -
Knowing that yellow fever may appear without evidence of
importation, and knowing that quarantine is at least liable to
evasion, I proclaim that if the people of New Orleans ever
place their reliance and abiding faith in any system of quaran-
tine as an absolute guarantee against the appearance and, at
times, prevalence of yellow fever, they lean upon a broken
reed which is destined to pierce the hand.

12
I will not allow myself to countenance this folly.”
In reply to another inquiry concerning the proclamation of
forty days quarantine and its apparent inconsistency with his
own declaration of its mischievous results and his recent pro-
posal of a better plan; he said that the State of Louisiana had
employed him as a hand in its commercial field and had fur-
mished him a wooden hoe wherewith to work.
He had suggested the necessity of an improved steel hoe,
and was now urging that very thing. “Until that is supplied
no one has a right to complain if the crop is in the grass.”
“The necessity of declaring a forty days quarantine is the in-
evitable and legitimate out-come or result of your present sys-
tem. The Board is obliged by every sense of duty to enforce
rigorously your measures of protection. .
Witnessing the transaction of last year and its calamities, • ,
we have given you a timely warning of thirty days. We have
foreseen and provided against these things.
We have known full well that as the danger period of July
and August, dark with portent, looms upon us, and mysterious
whisperings fill the air, a universal voice, husky with panic,
will demand more protection. -
We will permit no set of men, merchants, doctors or any
other class, to come in upon us and dictate the course we shall
pursue, or urge upon us a precipitate action wherein we are
made an instrument of heavy infliction upon most deserving
citizens in no position to defend themselves.
Any sudden action on our part must inevitably have caught
ship owners and freighters with charter-parties on their hands,
consignees with pressing orders on an advancing market, likely,
ships on the high seas with perishable cargoes bound for
this port, some entering the river, others already in quaran-
time, all under insurance obligations and all fallen under the
ban of excommunication, piles of freight on the levee awaiting
reshipment, engagements made, contracts signed and partly
executed; thousands and thousands of dollars sacrificed and

[3
hard working men made to suffer, the unnecessary victims of
precipitancy.
The embargo on commerce is bad enough, but at least we
have shielded you from these disasters.
The present system is simply one of detention, with only a
feeble effort towards sanitation. A vessel, after lying at quar.
antine many days, comes up here in almost the same condition
as when she arrived, as in the case of the Excelsior. This
must ever occur as long as the system is merely one of deten-
tion only, and ships come up to the city reeking with unclean-
Il BSS,
Whether we stand still or move on we will find objectors,
profoundly wise objectors either way.
In the mercantile profession as in the medical, there are
specialists, and like all of their class, they live and move and
have their being in the narrowest of grooves. They are edu-
cated to a perfection of restricted intelligence. r
Such men understand thoroughly their own particular
branch and personal interests. Like the faithful coralline,
they toil and store, but have no thought of the grand struc-
ture of which they are only an infinitesimal but important
element. - -
Few are capable of rising to a broad comprehension of the
great principles and generalizations of medicine or commerce.
There is neither surgery nor trade outside their own limited
specialty. - -
While the one can seldom rise to the altitude of the com.
prehensive, liberal physician, the other can seldom struggle to
the plane of the real merchant, the man of grand capacities,
who has measured the length and breadth of the commercial
fabric, who knows that in its structure are many parts, and
that upon the integrity of each depends the strength of the
whole. . . . " . . .
I shrewdly predict, if objections are urged against an amelio.
ration of this quarantine detention, we will hear of them in-
variably from the specialists, who are intensely solicitous that

14
put it in operation.
no experiments be tried to hazard the precious health of the
people; but who have not a dollar concerned in any branch
directy injured by an embargo on inter-tropical trade.
These are they who are amazed, who talk of the great interests - º
at stake in every direction but towards the south of us; who
ignore with contempt the fruit and coffee trade; who look
upon a declaration of non-intercourse with pleasing compla-
cency. -
It is singularly coincident, that their sympathies and pat-
riotic sentiments always side with their personal interests.
They have no sense of allegiance outside themselves.
Were a pestilence to threaten from the East, West or North,
they would instantly tack about with wonderful dexterity and
denounce as barbarous and irrational any system of detention
affecting their line of trade. -- #
We are prepared for the saints, and know just how to re-
ceive them. -
In reply to another inquiry, he stated that a petition was in
active process of preparation, memorializing the Legislature
as to the inadequacy of the present quarantine system, setting
forth clearly its mischievous and destructive effect upon com-
merce, while offering little assurance against importation of
infection. With this is presented a bill for an appropriation
of $25,000, to be devoted to the establishment of the new sys-
tem, offering a higher guarantee against yellow fever and at
the same time wholly removing the restrictions now destroy-
ing our commerce. - - - -
He stood to-day to ask the merchants to perform their whole
duty, indorse the plan of the Board of Health, and assist in
obtaining the appropriation from the Legislature. - -
Mr. Wight moved that the President of the meeting appoint
a committee to draw up resolutions indorsing Dr. Holt's sys.
tem, and request the Legislature to make an appropriation to
Mr. Marshall J. Smith suggested that in order that the

15
movement might be general and the matter rapidly placed
before the Legislature, the Chair be permitted to appoint a
committee of two from each Exchange. , g
Mr. Wight's resolution, as amended by Mr. Smith was unan-
imously carried. - . -
Mr. Dolbonde moved that the thanks of the meeting be ten-
dered to Dr. Holt for his address.
The meeting then adjourned.
President Converse appointed the following committee :
Produce Exchange—Pearl Wight, W. P. Ross.
Chamber of Commerce—R. S. Howard, A. Leduc.
Mechanics, Dealers' and Lumbermen's Exchange—Chas.
Garvey, John W. Adams. -
Maritime Association—L. Lacombe, A. LeBlanc.
Cotton Exchange—Adolph Schreiber, A. Brittin.
Sugar Exchange—R. B. Scudder, Adam Thomson.
Mexican Exchange—T. Adam Clayton, Marshall J. Smith.


THE FRUIT TRADE.
As an illustration of the possibilities of our commercial
growth we present here with a table showing the growth in the
single trifling item of intertropical fruit within five years and
a-half under a policy of exceptional leniency on the part of the
- Board O
f Health.
VALUE OF FRUITS IMPORTED THROUGH NEW ORLEANS FROM
JUNE 1, 1878, To DECEMBER 31, 1883.
Oranges, -
YEARS] Limes, Bananas. Pine Apples.|Cocoanuts. Totals.
Lemons. | |
1878. . . . $44,631 || $43,220 $2,730 $42,561 || $133,142
1879 ... 179,967 || 50,159 1,279 56,155 287,560
1880 . . 194,841 89,564 1,474 81,892 || 367,771
1881 .. 310,476 108,580 | 2,421 85,135 506,612
1882 ... 396,654 192,037 1,467 79,543 | 669,701
1883 .. 608,406 | 206,506 4,779 100,479 920,170
Totals |$1,734,975] $690,066 $13,650 $445,765 (2,884,456
Here is a rate of increase from $133,142, to $920,170, and a
showing for the present year of fifty per cent. on the latter.
to throw these things away, she
If New Orleans can afford
can afford to die.

THE OBLIGATIONS OF LOUISIANA
IN RELATION T ().
QUARANTINE AS A QUESTION OF STATE.
A SYNOPSIS OF THE ARGUMENT ADDRESSED TO THE SENATE
CoMMITTEE of FINANCE BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE
BoARD OF HEALTH OF THE STATE OF LOUISIANA, IN
IJRGING UPON THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY THE NECESSITY
OF AN AMPLE APPROPRIATION FOR THE ESTABLISHMENT
OF A MORE EFFICIENT QUARANTINE SERVICE.
On the morning of June 26th, 1884, Dr. Joseph Holt,
President of the Board of Health, Was requested to attend a
meeting of the Senate Finance Committee.
Being invited to lay before that body his views on the sub-
ject to which he was endeavoring to direct the attention of
the State government, he proceeded to expound his system of
quarantine as presented to, and endorsed by, the conference
of the Boards of Health of the Gulf States and Tennessee.
He introduced the subject by exhibiting the total failure and
utter worthlessness of the present system as convincingly
shown in the State records, covering a period of many years.
He proves conclusively that as a protection against pesti-
lence it offers an obstruction as thin as a veil, while to
commerce it is far more obdurate than Hell-Gate or the shoals
at the outlets of the Mississippi.
He then declared that, while pressing upon the people of
New Orleans with destructive brunt, this system is felt
injuriously by every planter and manufacturer throughout the
State. - ... *


18
Agriculture, manufactures and commerce have a correlative
existence.
The possibility of a successful farming comprehends abS 8,
part of it unobstructed channels to market. Whatsoever
injures the commerce of a State injures directly the entire
agricultural and manufacturing interests. To destroy the for
mer is the immediate destruction of the others, an injury to
any one is an injury to all. -
There is no such thing, nor can there exist an antago.
nism between these interests. Therefore, any jealousy on the
part of those engaged in these several pursuits is unphiloso.
phical and absurd. - - -
Viewed in its commercial and municipal aspect the case
is sufficiently grave; but when it addresses itself to you,
gentlemen, the representatives of the State, the conservators
of her integrity, of the health and material welfare of her
children, this question must be looked at from a higher point,
in a way far more comprehensive as a question of State, pre-
eminently the most important before this present Legislature, -
and as affecting the whole people, second only to a declaration
of war. -
The subject of State quarantine has long been a matter of
- NATIONAL INTEREST.
On account of the great disquietude for years existing between
the States of the Gulf, and in fact throughout the Mississippi
valley; the general apprehension and mutual lack of confi-
dence; these States and different communities in the States
being at times in a condition closely bordering on one of actual
war, with their shot-gun quarantines; the general government
conceived the idea of harmonizing these discordant elements
by systematizing the whole quarantine as a national institu-
tion, which would equalize the practical working of quaran-
tine, and give a stronger guarantee by scientific methods.
The people of Louisiana at first blush looked upon this with
great favor, and presently there sprung into existence the
National Board.
with true human instinct this body immediately displayed
an intense and grasping desire for more authority,


19 -
ing on the shorter base line.
. Our people quickly saw that these national health preservers
were certain to become the destroyers of our commercial
interests, saw that if it were true, as is generally believed,
that the powerful railroad lobby of Eastern capitalists could
control congressional legislation at the national capitol, how -
much more easily could it handle any central health board
of a few men, should the inducements so to do seem sufficient
to that gigantic power. - - . . . . . . . . .
The tremendous incentive to that course became more and
more evident as the present and constantly increasing strug-
gle for the bonanza of trade to the South of us grew in
intensity between the longitudinal lines leading from the heart
of the continent to the gulf ports, and the monster latitudinal
railroads running to the Atlantic cities.
With the power in the hands of a central Board, selected
and controlled by Eastern capitalists, to proclaim a quarantine
of arbitrary detention as against vessels from the South, the
keys to the gates of the Mississippi valley would be in the
possession of an agency most intensely hostile to the interests
of Louisiana and the neighboring States. . .
Our ports could and would be hermetically sealed arbitrarily
for six months in the year, and the vast export trade of the
valley forced to travel by the long and expensive latitudinal
lines of railroads, to New York, Philadelphia, Boston and
Baltimore, our commercial rivals, and hence by a tremen.
dously extended sea voyage to the tropical ports of delivery, -
and the import trade forced to seek the reverse journey. In
other words, the one side and the hypotheneuse of a right
angled triangle would have to be followed, instead of proceed-
That these powerful aggregations of capital could thus force
this immense trade from the natural channel is evident, if we
consider for a moment their immense capacities to achieve the
result,
Weig
of gold upon feeble human flesh represented in nine members
of a National Board, with the controlling power presently in
the hands of appointees from New York and the West.
h, for an instant, the pressure of hundreds of millions




- - 20
The great seaports of Norfolk, Baltimore, Philadelphia, New
York and Boston, the whole system of trans-continental
railroads, would send a swarm of agents every gummer into
Louisiana with microscopes and chemicals, hunting for germs;
the telegraph wires playing day and night transmitting start.
ling accounts of suspicious discoveries, and the public mind
of the whole country whipped into a fever of anxiety, as a
prelude to shutting up our port, ostensibly for yellow fever,
really in the commercial interests of rivals.
Louisiana fought that Natic nal Board on the broad princi-
ples of State's rights and actual self-preservation, and was
victorious; but in the moment of victory she gave repeated
pledges to her sister States that she would maintain an effi.
cient quarantine, such as would give the highest assurance
against the importation of pestilence.
Under this official promise on the part of the State Board
of Health, sustained by the whole voice of the people, we rest
under a moral obligation, to fail in which would be disgrace-
ful and most injurious to all our relations with surrounding
States. -
But, gentlemen, is the present quarantine the best she can
offer, when it has failed so often that the Board was compelled
last year to strangle commerce by declaring non-intercourse,
and this year forty days' detention, which is exactly the same?
If from lack of knowledge, or other like cause, she has failed
in the full measure of her promise, such can be offered in ex-
tenuation; but once informed of a better means, it becomes
her imperative duty of the most solemn kind to improve her
quarantine at any cost, not to do which will be taken as a vio-
lation of good faith O]] a pledge of honor, more reprehensible
than the violation of a treaty. Our neighbors will surely look
at it in this fashion.
They have already taken steps to test our good faith in the
QUARANTINE CONFERENCE AT NEW ORLEANs.
Early in the present month there assembled at New Orleans
a body of the health authorities of all the Gulf States and



2ſ
Tennessee, to discuss the proper means of doing away with
the mutual distrusts, the lack of confidence, the crimination
and recrimination which had been engendered in the past, and
which had so often erected Shotgun quarantines, established
blockades of railroad trains, created stoppages and detention
of vessels and goods on the great highways of commerce, and
exposed passengers, even delicate women, to cruel delays,
barbarous exposure and treatment, and the thousand other
evils that are the natural concomitants of insane panics.
At the very inception of that conference it devolved upon
me to read a paper in which was proposed in detail a system of
sanitation which would cure the defects of the existing
methods of quarantine against infected ports; which, by the
use of scientific and improved appliances, would enable a ship
to pass up to her destination in twenty-four or forty-eight
hours, if not with perfect and absolute security to the public
health, at least with a thousand-fold stronger guarantee than
the present system. . -
The whole conference, composed not only of theoretical sci-
entific experts, but of men whose experience for years had
been perhaps greater in the practical operation of quarantine
than any on the face of the globe, solemnly and unanimously
declared that the adoption and maintenance of the system and
method proposed would be more than satisfactory to them;
that if the State of Louisiana would adopt and put it into
practical operation, they would go home to their people and
their State authorities and tell them that they could rest
assured in the perfect security that all that human science
could do for their protection was being done; they would pro.
claim a truce to shotgun quarantines, the stoppage of trains,
and all the other barbarous interruptions of trade, commerce
and intercourse; that Louisiana and New Orleans should not be
looked upon any longer as the pest hole and the lazar-house
of the nation.
It is for the putting in operation of this system, the details
of. which have been endorsed by the whole commercial com.
munity of New Orleans, through their Exchanges, and have

22
been laid before the members of the Legislature in pamphlet
form, that this appropriation is asked.
As great as is the duty of meeting this tender, is
THE OBLIGATION OF THE STATE To ITs own PEOPLE.
This view of the case is so apparent, that I have little to
Say. .
Baton Rouge, every one of the river towns and parishes,
St. Mary, St. Landry, and in fact, almost every parish in the
State is vitally concerned in this question of State protection.
Those of us who are outside the city have been made to
suffer, time and again, the direct pangs of pestilence and
financial loss because of an inadequate quarantine. -
in addition to this, the commerce of the State belongs to
the interests of the people of the State. It is simply the
channel through which is made available agriculture and
manufactures. - . - --
- As AN INVESTMENT BY THE STATE.
Here is a call for $25,000 to establish a river quarantine,
and one that will not interfere with commerce. Let our legis-
lators just run their eyes from the top to the bottom of the ap-
propriation bill as it now stands, and show us one that prom:
ises to bring back immediately into the State treasury one
dollar given out. ' ' - ' -
An appropriation to establish the plant of a quarantine
which would afterward be fully self-sustaining, would strike
the shackles off commerce, and in one year bring in a revenue
through channels of legal taxation as would pay for the first
year fifteen per cent, on the investment, and go on indefinitely
increasing with increasing investments in all branches of busi-
mess. Let us consider its effect upon | , ,
THE Exposition AND MEXICAN, CENTRAL AND SOUTH
AMERICAN TRADE. --
is this grand Exposition, for which the bill of appropria-
tions allows $100,000, a city show for everybody to visit and
admire, or has it a great purpose, looking to the welfare of the


23
Director-General Burke, in a recent speech before the peo.
ple of New Orleans, urged the importance of the Exposition
as the medium of inviting to this State the commerce of those
vast regions south of us. He pointed to a huge map of the
world, and indicated on it the great lines of trade with Mexico,
the West Indies, the east and west coasts of South America,
Japan, China, Australia, the Panama canal, the Tehuantepec
railroad, all of this commerce through a hundred channels
converging into one mighty current, like the Gulf stream
pouring into the Caribbean Sea and Mexican Gulf, to sweep
through Eads' Jetties towards the heart of the continent.
This concentration from every quarter of the globe was the
grand achievement to be hastened by the Exposition.
These grand possibilities are all true, but the Director-Gen-
eral would have chilled his audience if he had gone on to tell
about ten days and forty days detention in quarantine of a
ship from Japan, via the port of Colon.
With the present quarantine, the great benefits of the Ex.
position in that direction are a failure. -
It is essential that the State shall jetty the quarantine, in
order to realize the possibilities of the Exposition.
Without this, the appropriation of $100,000 is that much
treasure thrown away. - -
There are three natural laws governing commerce, profound
* . and invariable, more persistently operative than international
or local regulations: -
* 1st. The currents of trade seek the shortest course.
| 2d. It is a law of commerce as of fluids, it follows the
course of least resistance.
- º 3d. With increase of the distance traversed there must be
increased assurance of unobstructed entry.
You cannot declare ten days detention against a vessel
which has winged her way from Hong-Kong, across the vast .
expause of the Pacific via Colon, through the Gulf and swoops
into the jetties like a huge albatross utterly weary with flight,
seeking rest and comfort. . . . . . .
-
We might detain one, but would certainly never have the ... : -
opportunity of practicing our quarantine on a second vessel
of that line, . . . . . . . . . .

24
Finally, gentlemen, the people of this State, while rightfully
resisting a discriminating and mischievous interference, are by
no means the only ones vitally concerned in this affair.
Holding the keys as janitor at the gate-way of the great
valley of the Mississippi, Louisiana is compelled by every
obligation to recognize the importance of her trust.
She can no longer bolt and double-bar these doors six
months out of the twelve with an antiquated quarantine of de-
tention, when it is optional, through a scientific sanitation to
fling open the entry of this national high-way, this inland
sea, to the unobstructed ingress and egress of all who may
apply. - . -
The interior States of this continent have a natural right in
every question touching the navigation of the Mississippi,
from its head-waters to the Gulf. They have a right to free
pasturage in the commercial fields beyond. . .
This claim is supreme, and one we must heartily allow.
Viewed from any point of observation, whether from that of
humanity or science, whether from that of the grand future of
commerce with our exterior or interior connections, the appro-
priation is the most absolutely important and imperatively
necessary that can engage the attention of the General Assem-
bly. In comparison with it all others seem to be dwarfed
into insignificance. . . . . . -
THE ACTION OF THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY.
Because of the lateness of the session it was out of the
question to obtain the passage of a separate act of appro-
priation. - . -
The Senate Finance Committee commended an amendment
to the general appropriation bill, allowing the Board of Health
for quarantine improvement the sum of $30,000, the full
amount applied for. The recommendation met the approval
of the Senate, and the House concurred. '.
Throughout the whole of this effort, the Governor zealously
promoted the purposes of the State Board of Health.
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