By Joel Salatin

I’ll never forget the morning, about twenty years ago, when a knock at the front door brought me face-to-face with a man who announced he was from the Virginia Meat and Poultry Inspection Division and he had just confiscated all of our fall-butchered beef at the local abattoir. He held up his big bronze badge, just like all the police do on TV cop shows, and said he was investigating us for selling illegal meat.

My knees went weak. My mouth went dry. My heart pounded and the color drained from my face. My farm, my livelihood, my family’s future, my customer’s expectations — everything whirled in my head at once. Fines, prison time, media headlines like “Local Alternative Farmer Arrested for Selling Illegal Meat” — the ramifications cascaded through my head as time stood still for a few seconds.

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