Iowan Politics

Iowa Senate Bill 315 when signed finally ended prohibition of raw milk sales in Iowa.

I hope we can all learn from this issue. 20 years ago I first went to the capitol to advocate for something for the first time. It was on ending this prohibition. My father grew up on a small dairy operation and I also had first hand experience with related issues. Two decades later and I don’t even drink dairy any more but I am glad that this finally came to pass.

When liberty is taken away by the state it takes a lot of hard work to get it back. We should think long and hard before we make any new laws. Any new laws should be clear, concise, and be able to be enforced in something resembling an equitable manner.

When I advocated for this issue many people could care less. “Don’t we have more important things to worry about”. Sure, and I worry about those things as well. However it quickly became clear to me after that first meeting at the capitol that a vast majority of the people that turned out to speak on the dangers of raw milk were lobbyists for the largest dairy producers. They presumably were worried that the competition from smaller operations and more people studying about milk would hurt their bottom line. A clear majority of those that spoke to ending this prohibition were individual citizens such as myself.

I learned most people, if not all, that wanted access to raw milk found a way around the prohibition. The population that would utilize the freedom to buy raw milk is small and everyone that would not buy it were never effected by this issue. No one that does not want raw milk to so much as hit their lips will ever be at risk of this happening. Yet, it still took decades to end this prohibition.

Whether you would ever care to purchase raw milk or not, I ask everyone to think about this and to apply these lessons to so many of our other laws that were always problematic or that are simply now made obsolete by market developments since their passing.