Today is March 19, 2024 / /

Kosher Nexus
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YET ANOTHER REASON WHY THE STATE CAN’T BE IN CHARGE OF KASHRUTH

Many of you may recall, that years ago there was a company in NY that made pareve eclairs. The company was called Rich’s, and they also made pareve creamer and pareve whipped topping.

Rich’s was an OU certified company. Well, it seems that every night as the mashgiach at the plant went to daven Maariv, the plant pulled all sorts of shenanigans with the eclairs. The end result was that the eclairs were made with sodium casseinate, and were dairy.

The company got caught. Instead of the State or the OU notifying everyone to either pull the product or label it as dairy, the KLE impounded the product in every store that carried it and fined the store owners for selling as pareve, dairy products.

That is an example of why the State should not be involved in Kashruth beyond the level of consumerism.
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As for our argument that the State may not be a posek:

NYS took upon itself to measure the amount of salty residue on meat sold as soaked and salted. They set upper and lower limits of salt residue. If you did not fall into the limits, you were accused of fraud. Never mind that there is no definition of just how much salt you must use. Never mind that some stores do a better job of rinsing the meat than others. Nope- the State of NY became a posek. They decided what the proper amount of salt was.

Guess what good people? That is unconstitutional.