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312278367
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50th Anniversary Year of the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act [1988]
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312278367
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50th Anniversary Year of the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act [1988]
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Records of the White House Correspondence Office
Proclamations Files
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Ronald Reagan Presidential Library
Digital Library Collections
This is a PDF of a folder from our textual collections.
Collection: Correspondence, White House Office of:
Records, 1981-89
Folder Title: 50th Anniversary Year of the Federal
Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act
Box: Box 83 (1988)
To see more digitized collections visit:
https://www.reaganlibrary.gov/archives/digitized-textual-material
To see all Ronald Reagan Presidential Library Inventories, visit:
https://www.reaganlibrary.gov/archives/white-house-inventories
Contact a reference archivist at: [email protected]
Citation Guidelines: https://reaganlibrary.gov/archives/research-
support/citation-guide
National Archives Catalogue: https://catalog.archives.gov/
Last Updated: 05/23/2023
THE OF SALVIS OF THE UNITED
50th Anniversary Year of the Federal
Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act, 1988
By the President of the United States of America
A Proclamation
Half a century ago, in 1938, the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act was
signed into law by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. This legislation was
the start of modern food and drug regulation. That this year is the 50th
anniversary of that legislation reminds each of us to be grateful for our
American legacy of concern for protecting the public health.
The 1938 Act covered cosmetics, medical devices, food additives, and pesti-
cides, but made its strongest impact by giving the Food and Drug Administra-
tion the authority and responsibility for approving new drugs for safety before
they could be sold. These drug review provisions came just at the beginning of
the "first therapeutic revolution," when penicillin and sulfa drugs were being
discovered. Wave after wave of new drug classes were discovered in the
1940's and 1950's, and the new drug review system enabled patients and
physicians to have a level of confidence in medications that had never before
existed.
To this day, the Food and Drug Administration uses the provisions of the 1938
Act, as amended over the years, to establish rigorous standards for food and
drug safety that are widely respected and emulated.
The Congress, by House Joint Resolution 600, has recognized the 50th anniver-
sary of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act and authorized and request-
ed the President to issue a proclamation in observance of this anniversary.
NOW, THEREFORE, I, RONALD REAGAN, President of the United States of
America, do hereby proclaim 1988 as the 50th Anniversary Year of the Federal
Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act, 1988. I call upon the people of the United States
to observe this anniversary with appropriate ceremonies and activities.
IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this second day of
November, in the year of our Lord nineteen hundred and eighty-eight, and of
the Independence of the United States of America the two hundred and
thirteenth.
Ronald Reagon