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from the slow-roasting-grills-of-justice dept.
A federal judge on Tuesday roasted Arkansas' law banning makers of meatless meat products from using words such as "burger," "sausage," "roast," and "meat" in their labeling.
[...] Judge Kristine Baker, of the US District Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas, granted a preliminary injunction that prevents the state from enforcing the law while the legal case is ongoing. In her order, Judge Baker made clear that the law appears to violate the Free Speech Clause of the First Amendment—as Tofurky argued. She determined that the state will likely lose the case.
[...] "The State argues that Tofurky's labels for its plant-based products are inherently misleading because they use the names and descriptors of traditional meat items but do not actually include the product they invoke, including terms like 'chorizo,' 'hot dogs,' 'sausage,' and 'ham roast,'" Judge Baker noted. Such misleading or false labels would not be protected commercial speech under the First Amendment, the state claimed.But Judge Baker essentially called that argument bologna.
[...] She went on to cite a ruling in a similar case that determined that "Under Plaintiffs' logic, a reasonable consumer might also believe that veggie bacon contains pork, that flourless chocolate cake contains flour, or that e-books are made out of paper.""That assumption is unwarranted," she went on. "The labels in the record evidence include ample terminology to indicate the vegan or vegetarian nature of the products."
[...] Meat and dairy industry groups have been increasingly working to try to limit the use of terms like "milk" and "meat" in other states and contexts as meatless and diary-free products continue to grow in popularity. Missouri, Mississippi, Louisiana, and South Dakota have similar anti-veggie-meat labeling laws. In Wisconsin, lawmakers have considered banning non-dairy products from using the word "milk," such as beverages labeled almond milk.The latter issue led former FDA commissioner Scott Gottlieb to quip last year that "You know, an almond doesn't lactate." He said that the Food and Drug Administration is working on a guidance for the use of the term.
https://arstechnica.com/science/2019/12/judge-serves-up-sizzling-rebuke-of-arkansas-anti-veggie-meat-labeling-law/
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(Score: 3, Informative) by datapharmer on Sunday December 15 2019, @02:01PM (1 child)
The funny thing is that legal “standard of identity” already exists and has been around for decades. It got started after the olden days of food manufacturing when you had no idea what you were getting - think “The Jungle”. You can read them here: https://www.accessdata.fda.gov/scripts/cdrh/cfdocs/cfcfr/CFRSearch.cfm?CFRPart=130 [fda.gov]
No need for State laws, just enforcement which the current executive branch has no interest in doing.
While standards of identity can change, they are regulated and sausage does specify it contains meat, and meat is fat and protein of animals. If something else is sold as sausage it is in violation of federal regulations unless those regulations are changed.
(Score: 2) by Booga1 on Sunday December 15 2019, @02:10PM
Interesting. Stuff like this bugs the heck outta me. So many times I see people say something like "there ought to be a law!" Yet, there is already a law in place, but nobody's enforcing it. So, there's a push to make a new law to cover some smaller detail or particular situation. Repeat ad infinitum.
P.S. I think the worst of the bunch is when you basically tack on something like, "on a computer" to the offense, as if the original law didn't cover it.