In May 2006 the House of Representatives voted on the 2007 Farm Bill amendment authored by Texas Representative Ron Paul to block funding for the USDA’s National Animal Identification System (NAIS). The day the amendment was voted on, Tennessee Representative John Duncan made the following remarks on the House floor:

“I rise in strong support today of the gentleman's amendment in opposition to the National Animal Identification System. Two Tennessee legislators who also represent parts of my District, State Representative Frank Niceley and my own State Senator Tim Burchett, have introduced a bill to prohibit the use of state funds to implement this program in Tennessee.

“As Representative Niceley told the Knoxville News Sentinel,‘I think this thing had more to do with the selling of chips than anything else.’ He said: ‘I just get tired of businesses going to Washington and selling their business plan up there and getting rich off the public.’

“The people pushing this are international and national bureaucrats, who want more power and control, their academic supporters, and especially a very few agri-giant businesses. Small and medium-sized farmers don't want it.

“Ron Freeman, a fifth generation cattleman said, ‘NAIS will not prevent or control disease. Instead it will allow the government and big business to control our food supply and intrude into the lives of every farmer and rancher.’

Judith McGeary, a Texas lawyer, described the program as ‘one of the most far-reaching acts of surveillance of the most wholesome activities of US citizens. Children with 4-H pet goats, senior citizens raising food for themselves, friends going on trail rides, would all be forced to endure the warrantless government surveillance.’

“If this isn't Big Brother government, I don't know what is.

“This system isn't traditional conservatism. Costs of new programs such as this are always low-balled on the front end.

“The President of the Australian Cattlemen's Association called this program ‘the single worst thing to ever hit the farming industry in Australia.’ He said they were promised it would only cost $3 a head, but costs were already running $37 a head, counting cost of scanners and various indirect costs.

“A family in Roane County, Tennessee, Everett Phillips has only eight beef cattle, a milk cow, some chickens and a few barnyard animals. Add up the cost, inconvenient federal bureaucracy and privacy concerns, and ‘it's going to hurt the farmer.’ He said he'd consider selling out and moving to Argentina.

“If this is still a free country,” said Representative John Duncan, “we should at least make the program voluntary instead of mandatory.”

A lot of Rural Heritage subscribers were among many Americans who contacted their Representatives in Congress asking them to vote for Ron Paul’s amendment to block NAIS funding. We must have made a ripple, because Ron Paul’s office reported getting a lot of calls from other Representatives asking, “What’s NAIS?”

Still, all but 34 of the Representatives who voted on the amendment went along with the USDA’s claim that NAIS is about food security, disease control, and bio-terrorism.

How They Voted

Gail Damerow is editor of Rural Heritage. This article appeared in the Summer 2006 issue.