Austin Zimmerman All through United States History, laws and amendments have been passed to benefit the American society and citizens socially, politically and economically. These laws and amendments often have a positive affect on society. Two major laws and amendments that impacted American Society were the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906 and the 19th amendment giving woman rights. The United States industries were all growing in the late 1800’s and this caused the way food was produced to change. Before the industrial revolution most American’s were farming and growing their own food. If they didn’t grow their own then they would get it from a neighbor or small town store. Because it wasn’t easy to preserve food it was generally eaten soon after the animals were slaughtered or the food was harvested. However, with large monopolies forming they began to produce mass amounts of food to sell to the public. With the growth of cities, food had to be sent long distances to get the people in the cities. Food manufactures needed to come up with a way to preserve this food while it is on the long route to get to the cities. They began to hire chemists to find ways to preserve the food, because there were not many laws that dealt with the distribution and preparation of food products they were able to put preservatives in the food. However, if the meat spoiled they would also put a dye in it to make the color back to normal and would sell the spoiled meat. The meat packing industry was one of the worst. The meat was often prepared from diseased animals and shoveled around on dirty floors without being cleaned or sanitized. The tables they cut the meat on were rarely cleaned and often dirty. Upton Sinclair knew about the disgusting ways that the meatpacking industry was producing their meat and he wrote the novel The Jungle which showed the public what was in their