Upton Sinclair’s “The Jungle” Moves the Government
To Clean Up the Food Supply
Upton Sinclair’s “The Jungle,” gave the most in-depth discreption of the horrid
truths about the way America’s food companies, “the only source of food for people
living in the city’s,” are preparing the food they sell. “The Jungle” describes the terrible
conditions of a Lithuanian family that moved to the US, and had to work, live, and die for
the food companies in Chicago. “The Jungle” spurred a movement in the American
people to do something about the problems facing the American food supply. Because of
the growing concern about the quality of food in America the government took action to
prevent further problems. Thus the Food and Drug Act of 1906 was passed to fix the
problems. The Food and Drug Act was a true example of how the people of our nation
influenced the government to take action, to solve a growing problem effecting the
American people.
“The Jungle” talks about a couple who move to an area of Chicago, “known as
Packtown,” from Lithuania. Packtown is the center of Chicago’s meat packing industry. It
is a hard, dangerous, and filthy place where it is difficult to find a job. Some relatives of
the couple and themselves get a house, but find out it is a swindle. Expenses increase and
forces the children of the family to find work like the adults. Jobs in Packtown are
The Essay on What Factors Determine/influence The Food Choice People Make?
Food, which is the only energy source for human, is essential in peoples’ life. It has many different kinds which gives people different kinds of nutrition. Go through the thousands of years of evolution, diet have become not only an important part of peoples’ life but also a culture. People who are living all over the world have different food choices. The three important factors that influence ...
back-breaking , unsafe, and have no regard for individual workers. The oldest of the
family gets a job, but it is to difficult for the old man and he quickly dies. The man of the
couple, “Jurgis,” is forced to work in an unheated packing house during the winter. Jurgis
is injured and cant work for three months receiving no pay. One of the children dies of
food poisoning. Jurgis joins a union and slowly begins to understand the way politics and
bribery that control Packingtown. After attacking the boss of his wife for making her
sleep with him, Jurgis is put in jail for a month. While in Jail the family has been evicted
from there home and is living in a run-down boardinghouse. When Jurgis returns home
he finds his wife in premature labor, and in the process of giving birth the child and her.
Jurgis disappears on a drinking binge. With the help of a wealthy woman who takes and
interest in the family, Jurgis finds a job at a steel mill. He is renewed in hope dedicating
himself to Antanas, “his son.” But Jurgis is distroyed when he discovers that Antanas has
drown in the mud-logged street. Jurgis then abandons the rest of the family and
disappears. After years of wondering from job to job, being injured, and being put back
in jail for a month, Jurgis wonders into a socialist political rally. The speech the orator
delivers inspires Jurgis, and he joins the socialist party. He gets a job in a socialist-run
hotel and is reunited with a member of is family. The book ends with Jurgis having lost
almost all of his family and life to the terrible conditions of life in Chicago, but gains new
beliefs in socialism. This is just a very shortened up summery of “The Jungle.” In many
parts of the book it describes the rotten and diseased meat. “The cans have shiny,
attractive surfaces but contain’s a mass of putrid meat unfit for Human
consumption.”(Sparknotes, Quotations) In one part of the book it talks about a man who
would be shoveling the meat into carts, and would not trouble to lift out a rat even when
he saw one. There were many things that went into the meat that made the poisoned rat
The Term Paper on One Day Jurgis Job Socialist
The novel ' The Jungle' by Upton Sinclair took place in the 1900's the main character in this book is Jurgis Rud kis and his dynamic change to Socialism. He started out as a young and strong man looking for the "american dream." He left Lithuania in hope of starting a family and a cordial Life. The beginning of this book starts at the wedding of Jurgis and Ona Lukoszaite which I believe symbolizes ...
as a tidbit. Men would have no place to wash their hands before eating, and so they
washed them in the water tat was ladled into the sausage. Ends of meat, scraps of corned
beef, and all odds and ends of the waste of the plants, would be dumped into old barrels
to set until the spring. In the spring the barrels of rotten, and diseased scraps would be
dumped into the hoppers with fresh meat to be sent out to the public for sale.
(Sparknotes) Though it was not Upton Sinclairs original intentions to raise such an outcry
about the way the food was processed, it did very precisely describe the revolting
conditions during that time period.
When Upton Sinclair’s book “The Jungle” reached the American public it did not
bring the movement of socialist reforms that Sinclair wished the book to bring. Instead it
brought the entire nation to its feet, when they found out just what they and there children
were eating. A single chapter in the novel brought the image of all kinds of wastes being
dumped in with the meat. It infuriated the nation that wastes were being dumped in
without any regard for the people by greedy capitalists. (Sparknotes) With the knowledge
of floor sweepings, rats, and parts of an occasional workman went into the grinders, the
people looked to the government for answers. (Weisberger) With the enormous outcry
from the people led to an investigation by the federal government. When the
governmental inquiry came in assuring the nations worst fears the meat sales in the US
were cut in half, and angered President Roosevelt. Now that the facts were in, and the
people knew about them, there was a gigantic force pushing for immediate legislation of
the Food and Drug industries.(Mikula, Mabunda) Though it was not Upton Sinclair’s
primary goal, his book “The Jungle” was the source of the biggest outcry for meat
inspection aimed at protecting the American public.
One crusader that stood above for food regulation was Harvey Wiley. He had
campaigned for years against what he called and outrageous and lethal frauds of the
meat-packing, canning, and many other food- processing corporations. In 1883 he
The Term Paper on The Food And Drug Administration
The Food and Drug Administration Abstract This paper aims to discuss the way the U.S Food and Administration department makes its rules and how the agency implements them. It also presents an analysis of the enforcement process in the United States and gives a way forward on the improvement in the enforcement of the law. Introduction Body Background of the Food and Drug Administration. How the FDA ...
became the chief chemist for the Department of Agriculture. He was one of the prime
leaders that took the movement created by “The Jungle” and used it to push his bill to
congress. He gave speeches, and testified before committees considering legislation on
the subject. (Weisberger) On June 30, 1906 Congress passed the Pure Food and Drug Act
or otherwise known as The “Wiley Act”. “The act outlawed the manufacture or
“adulterated or misbranded” food or drugs and prohibited their introduction into interstate
or foreign commerce.” (Levy, Karst; pg. 2083-2084) The act gave full authority to make
rules and regulations to the Secretary of the Treasury, the Secretary of Agriculture, and
the Secretary of Commerce and Labor. The examinations of specimens of foods and
drugs were to be made in the Bureau of Chemistry of the Department of Agriculture, for
determining from examinations whether such articles are adulterated or misbranded
within the limits of the Act. Offending products could be seized and condemned;
offending persons could be fined and jailed. Drugs had to either abide by standards of
purity and quality set forth by the United States Pharmacopoeia, or they had to meet
individual standards made by the manufacturers and stated on their labels. Making false
or misleading label statements regarding a food or a drug constituted misbranding. This
law sought to product the consumer from being deceived or harmed, by following
assumptions that the average man was prudent enough to plot his one course. The act
went to great lengths to make sure that every part of the act was understood. They defined
Adulterations as any substance that has been mixed with to reduce or lower or injuriously
affect its quality or strength. Also if the “product was mixed, colored, powdered, coated,
or stained in a manner where by damage or inferiority is concealed. Finally it defended it
as “consists in whole or in part of a filthy, decomposed, or putrid animal or vegetable
substance, or any portion of and animal unfit for food, whether manufactured or not, or if
it is the product of a diseased anima. or one that has died otherwise that by slaughter.”
The Essay on Food and Herbal Products
The Problem Introduction In the rapid development of our present generation on how a certain raw material produces different food and herbal products that can be processed, satisfies the needs of every human being to fill their stomach. Time after time, many food and herbal products have been developed and commercially valuable to stop health risks. The existence of this processed products does ...
(FDA, pg. 4) The government wanted to show just how serious it took the matter of food
and drug regulation. In the act it said, “any person who shall violate any of the provisions
of the section shall be guilty of a misdemeanor, and for each offense shall, upon
conviction thereof, be fined not to exceed five hundred dollars or shall be sentenced to
one year’s imprisonment, both such fine and imprisonment, in the discretion of the court,
and for each subsequent offense and conviction thereof shall be fined not less than one
thousand dollars or sentenced to one year’s imprisonment, or both such fine and
imprisonment, in the discretion of the court.” (FDA, pg. 2) At this point in time the act
showed that the government did not take lightly to violating its new laws.
From respectable authorities on the subject, and the 1906 Food and Drugs Act
itself, gave paticual understanding of the events effecting that time period, a
understanding of certain points in the novel “The Jungle”, and how the government went
about solving the nation’s going problem, has lead myself to agree that Upton Sinclairs’s
“The Jungle” had a major role in moving the government to clean up the food supply.
Which by the approval of the 1906 Food and Drugs Act, the government succeeded in
solving the problem. “The Jungle” showed to the nation the scam of biblical antiquity,
that was effecting there very lives. It rallied the people to make the government find a
solution to prevent further sicknesses and deaths because of greedy capitalists. The
government set forth the Food and Drugs Act of 1906 in response which regulated and
examined products developed by food and drug companies. Upton Sinclair provided the
motive, and the government supplied the solution. Because of the these two forces we, in
our day in time, can rest assured that our food and drugs are of the very top quality, and
purity for human consumption.
