butter...butter...paarkaaaay...STOP THAT! Allright boys, take him in!!!

(SCENE: The breakfast table of an average Missouri home. MAN eating stack of steaming hot pancakes about to place some margarine between the yummy steamy flapjacks and place syrup all over ‘em when a COP enters…)

COP (Irish accent - rugged, gruff and disgusted): Oh dear, it’s a good thing I showed up. Now boy-oh, you cant put that stuff on your pancakes! Give me your wrists, I’m gonna haveta shackle ya and take ya in.

MAN (in disbelief): I swear officer, I didn’t even know it was illegal…it told me it was butter…

COP: Ignorance of the law’s no excuse…(proceeds to rough up MAN, shackles him and takes him to squad car waiting outside…)

Mo. considers decriminalizing margarine

ASSOCIATED PRESS via stltoday.com

12/16/2008

JEFFERSON CITY (AP) -- A southwest Missouri lawmaker wants to decriminalize margarine.

House member Sara Lampe said Tuesday that she plans to file legislation repealing Missouri's butter law, which dates to 1895.

The law restricts the sale, possession or shipment of imitation butter and bans yellow-tinted varieties. Those dealing contraband dairy products can be fined up to $100 and jailed for up to a month.

Lampe, a Springfield Democrat, said the law doesn't make sense anymore.

Enforcement is up to the state Department of Agriculture. And spokeswoman Misti Preston said the butter laws are no longer enforced.

Preston said the regulations likely were created to protect Missouri's dairy industry.