Constitutional Law using Westlaw for Cosgrove Militano, CRJS 210
Animal Rights - Is the Treatment of Animals Improving?
1. CQ
Animal Rights
Researcher Published by CQ Press, a Division of SAGE
www.cqresearcher.com
Is the treatment of animals improving?
he passage of dozens of tough state animal-protection
T laws last year reflects growing public interest in
animal welfare. Today, many Americans view pets as
family members, and some even leave bequests to
pets in their wills. Vegetarianism has gone mainstream as people
have become concerned about the conditions on factory farms,
and many scientists say farm animals have feelings. Fifteen years
ago, only 10 of the country’s law schools offered animal-law
courses; today about 130 do. At the same time, however, billions
of animals are slaughtered for food each year in our meat-eating Rhesus monkeys hug at a research facility in Great
Britain, where labs must protect the physical and
mental well-being of social animals like monkeys
society, and live-animal research is a major tool of biomedicine. by housing them in groups and giving them toys.
Similar laws apply to primates and some other
research animals in the U.S.
The food industry, researchers and others who depend on using
and killing animals are fighting back against what they call I
overblown concerns about animal rights. Last November, for example, N
S
THIS REPORT
Ohio voters approved an amendment to the state’s constitution THE ISSUES ........................3
barring the legislature from approving any animal-protection laws I
CHRONOLOGY....................11
that would apply to farms.
D
BACKGROUND ....................12
E
CURRENT SITUATION ............16
CQ Researcher • Jan. 8, 2010 • www.cqresearcher.com AT ISSUE ..........................17
Volume 20, Number 1 • Pages 1-24
OUTLOOK ........................19
RECIPIENT OF SOCIETY OF PROFESSIONAL JOURNALISTS AWARD FOR
EXCELLENCE N AMERICAN BAR ASSOCIATION SILVER GAVEL AWARD BIBLIOGRAPHY ..................22
THE NEXT STEP ..................23
3. Animal Rights
BY MARCIA CLEMMITT
THE ISSUES
he intensifying clash be-
Fisher, executive vice president
of the Ohio Farm Bureau Fed-
eration. “Because we experi-
enced a little bit of farm life,
T tween animal-welfare
advocates and animal-
using industries heated up
we weren’t inclined to ques-
tion farming practices or
question farmers’ character.
last year when President Today, it’s a different story. 4
Understanding Animal Research/Wellcome Images
Obama tapped Harvard law “A highly organized and
professor Cass R. Sunstein to well-financed operation” con-
oversee federal regulations ducted by animal-welfare
for American citizens and groups like the Humane So-
businesses. ciety of the United States
Republican Sen. John (HSUS) “is under way to
Cornyn of Texas, who placed convince you that farmers are
a “hold” on the nomination to cruel to their animals. It’s
prevent a vote, particularly trickery, but effective,” Fisher
objected to Sunstein wanting said. If HSUS’s “Washington
“to establish legal ‘rights’ for lobbyists and Hollywood
livestock, wildstock and pets,” celebrities can convince you
as a Cornyn spokesperson told that farmers mistreat their live-
Fox News. 1 stock, then maybe you’ll de-
In 2004, Sunstein had mand changes on the farm,
coauthored a book suggest- Hens are crammed into cages to facilitate egg laying changes that you’ve been
ing that animals have legal and gathering. The treatment of chickens and other farm led to believe are about an-
rights, and many businesses animals reflects the conflict over animal rights. In imal welfare but in reality
that sell animal products, fac- California, for example, beginning in 2015 farms will be are calculated steps to limit
required to house veal calves, egg-laying hens and
tory farms, universities that pregnant pigs in conditions that allow them to lie down, your access to locally grown,
pursue animal research, as stand up and turn around freely. In Ohio, however, safe, affordable food.” 5
well as hunters, feared the voters in 2009 overwhelmingly barred the passage of But others say the picture
administration was about to any laws against cruelty to farm animals. Fisher paints of local family
embrace an animal-protection agenda. animal ownership is the same as own- farms run on the principle that what’s
Sunstein ultimately won confirma- ing slaves and that their struggle to good for animals is good for people
tion after assuring senators that he achieve rights for animals is the moral is outdated, since huge “factory” farms
“would not take any steps to promote equivalent of the civil rights or women’s now dominate the industry, with the
litigation on behalf of animals,” de- suffrage movements. In reality, it is result that concern for profits trumps
spite having stated in the past that human life they wish to devalue, low- animal welfare. 6
people should be allowed to bring ering us to a status equal with — or At one time, “I viewed factory farm-
lawsuits on behalf of animals that they less than — animals.” 3 ing as one of the lesser problems fac-
believe have been treated cruelly. 2 Last year in Ohio, voters over- ing humanity — a small wrong on the
Loretta Baughan, editor of Spaniel whelmingly approved a farm industry- grand scale of good and evil,” but “this
Journal, is among those who fear con- backed amendment to the state con- view changed as I . . . saw a few typ-
cern about animal protection might stitution barring Ohio lawmakers and ical farms up close,” said Matthew
trigger new laws and regulations. “Some the voting public from enacting any Scully, a former special assistant to
fanatic animal-rights believers advo- laws against animal cruelty applying President George W. Bush, whose
cate for ‘non-human’ animals to be to the agriculture industry. 2002 book Dominion: The Power of
granted ‘personhood’ and legal rights The measure, Issue 2, “wouldn’t have Man, the Suffering of Animals, and the
enabling individuals and groups to take been necessary a few decades ago. Call to Mercy, argues for strong regu-
owners to court on behalf of their an- Everyone had grandpas or cousins who lation of the meat industry. 7
imal,” she said. “The whole premise let us climb on their tractors and look “When corporate farmers need
behind animal rights is a belief that around in their barns,” said John C. barbed wire around their Family Farms
www.cqresearcher.com Jan. 8, 2010 3
4. ANIMAL RIGHTS
ing purposes “lie covered in their own
Toughest State Laws Make Cruelty a Felony urine and excrement, with broken legs
Two states in the West, two in the Midwest and one on the East Coast from trying to escape or just to turn,
have the “best” animal-protection laws, according to the Animal covered with festering sores, tumors,
ulcers, lesions, or what my guide
Legal Defense Fund. The laws include felony penalties for cruelty
shrugged off as the routine ‘pus pock-
and neglect and strong animal-fighting provisions. The five states ets,’ ” said Scully.
with the “worst” ranking do not make extreme neglect a felony, “The usual comforting rejoinder we
among other shortcomings. hear — that it’s in the interest of farm-
ers to take good care of their animals
States With the “Best” Animal Protection Laws — is false,” he said. “Each day, in every
Maine* confinement farm in America, you will
Wash. Mont. N.D.** Minn.
N.H. find cull pens littered with dead or
Vt.
Wis.
dying creatures discarded like trash.”
S.D.
Ore.* Idaho** Wyo. Mich.*
As animal-based food production be-
N.Y. Mass.
Neb.
Iowa
R.I.
comes a larger and larger industry, ani-
Pa. mal welfare is increasingly at odds with
Nev. Ill.* Ind. Ohio Conn.
Utah Colo.
Kan. Mo.
W.Va. N.J. farming’s business interests, said Gene
Ky.** Va. Del. Baur, president of the farm-animal-
Calif.*
Tenn. N.C. Md.
Ariz.
Okla. Ark. protection organization Farm Sanctuary,
N.M. S.C. D.C.
Miss.
Ga.
based in Watkins Glen, N.Y. For ex-
Ala.
La.
** ample, “to produce egg-laying breeds
Texas
Top tier
of hens, hatcheries discard millions of
Alaska Middle tier
unwanted male chicks every year. . . .
Fla. Bottom tier
Hawaii** I was at a hatchery once and watched
living chicks . . . sent into a manure
spreader to be spread on a field as
Selected Characteristics of Selected Characteristics of manure.” 9
“Best” Five “Worst” Five Modern animal science continually
provides more reasons to pay greater
• Felony penalties for cruelty and • No felony penalties for cruelty
heed to animal welfare, even to the
neglect and neglect
point of eliminating human use of an-
• Increased penalties for repeat • Inadequate animal-fighting
imals altogether, some animal-rights ad-
abusers provisions
vocates say. Chickens, for example, which
• Full range of statutory protections • Inadequate definitions and
don’t even qualify for protection under
• Strong animal-fighting provisions standards for basic care
the U.S. Humane Slaughter Act forbid-
• Humane agents have some • No restrictions on animal owner-
ship following a conviction
ding the cruel killing of conscious an-
law-enforcement authority
imals, are now known to have com-
• No mental health evaluations for
* denotes “top” five states offenders plex brains, perceptions and emotions,
according to People for the Ethical
** denotes “worst” five states
Treatment of Animals (PETA), a large
Source: Stephan K. Otto, “2009 State Animal Protection Laws Rankings,” Animal animal-rights group in Norfolk, Va.
Legal Defense Fund, December 2009 “While most people are less fa-
miliar with pigs, chickens, fish and
and Happy Valleys and laws [in at agricultural “duty” of attending to an- cows than they are with dogs and
least two states] to prohibit outsiders imals’ welfare, he said. “With no laws cats, animals used for food are every
from taking photographs,” as well as to stop it, moral concern surrendered bit as intelligent and able to suffer
“laws to exempt farm animals [from] entirely to economic calculation, leav- as the animals who share our homes,”
federal and state cruelty statutes, ing no limit to the punishments that says the group on its GoVeg.com
something is amiss,” said Scully. As factory farmers could inflict to keep blog. “Pigs can learn to play video
factory farms grew larger over the past costs down and profits up.” 8 games,” while chickens have “cul-
century, farmers forgot the traditional On hog farms, sows kept for breed- tural knowledge that they pass down
4 CQ Researcher
5. from generation to generation,” care-
fully protect their young from dan- Many New Protection Laws Enacted in 2009
ger and communicate with each other
Several states enacted a total of 121 new animal-protection laws in
using more than 30 separate calls —
all evidence that the animals have a
2009, about one-third more than enacted in 2008. Nevada became
right to live free of suffering and the 50th state in the country to explicitly ban the possession of dogs
brutality imposed by humans who for fighting. Oregon and Pennsylvania enacted laws limiting the
raise and slaughter them for food, use of puppy mills. California became the first state to ban the
PETA argues. 10 tail docking of cows.
While the hottest battleground in
animal rights today is farm animals, Select Animal-Rights Legislation by State, 2009
there have also been high-profile clash-
es in recent months between animal- California — First state to ban the tail docking of dairy
rights activists and another of their tra- cows.
ditional foes, biomedical scientists who
conduct research on animals. Kansas — Became the 39th state to make cockfighting a
Last summer, animal-rights protesters felony.
in Europe vandalized the grave of the
mother of Daniel Vasella, CEO of Basel,
Maine — Became the sixth state to prohibit confinement of
Switzerland-based Novartis pharma- farm animals in gestation and veal crates.
ceuticals, and may have burned Vasel- Nevada — Became the final state in the nation to ban the
la’s Austrian vacation home to protest
possession and training of dogs for fighting.
Novartis’ contracts with Huntingdon
Life Sciences (HLS), a company that New Jersey — Required all garments containing real fur to
conducts drug-safety tests using ani- be labeled with the species of animal and its country of origin.
mals. United Kingdom-based HLS has
a U.S. facility in Princeton, N.J., and Oregon — Joined Louisiana, Washington and Virginia in
the company’s workers have been limiting the size of puppy mills.
prosecuted in the past for animal
cruelty; in an incident caught on tape Pennsylvania — Passed legislation to prohibit some of
by an animal activist who’d infiltrated the more painful and unsafe surgical procedures commonly
an HLS facility, a worker laughed as performed on dogs in puppy mills.
he repeatedly punched a puppy in
the snout. 11 Source: “2009: A Record-Breaking Year of State Victories,” Humane Society of the
In November, University of Min- United States, December 2009
nesota police increased security
around the Minneapolis home of Dick death in the pursuit of knowledge that tests now in anticipation of such an
Bianco, an associate professor of may or may not be very useful. enterprise is in no way justified,” the
surgery, who is helping to launch a For example, the Physicians Com- group says. 13
national campaign to increase pub- mittee for Responsible Medicine, which But advocates of animal research
lic support for medical research promotes ethical research and gener- argue that many benefits have flowed
using animals. The police acted after ally opposes animal testing, is circu- and continue to flow from biomedical
animal advocate Camille Marino, lating a petition to stop new radiation research using animals.
founder of the Negotiation Is Over studies planned by the National Aero- “If you’re healthy, then you say, ‘Let’s
Web site, posted Bianco’s photo and nautics and Space Administration. not use any animals,’ ” says Frankie
contact information, along with the state- In the studies, squirrel monkeys Trull, founder and president of the
ment that “abusers need to understand would be dosed with radiation to Washington-based Foundation for Bio-
that their unethical behaviors entail study potential effects of long-distance medical Research, which disseminates
tangible consequences.” 12 space travel. But “interplanetary human information in support of animal re-
Many animal-welfare advocates argue travel is, at best, a highly speculative search. But out of the last 40 Nobel
that much of today’s animal research aim for the foreseeable future,” and prizes in medicine, 32 were awarded
subjects animals to pain, distress and “to put animals through radiation for work that included animal research.
www.cqresearcher.com Jan. 8, 2010 5
6. ANIMAL RIGHTS
“The Nobel Committee certainly be- we require animals to suffer intensely related to citizenship, for example,
lieves that animal research is produc- for human benefit all the time, wrote says Kenneth Shapiro, executive di-
ing useful knowledge,” she says. Hugh LaFollette, an ethics professor rector of the Animals and Society In-
As lawmakers, scientists, farmers and at the University of South Florida, in stitute, an Ann Arbor, Mich.-based think
animal-welfare advocates battle over St. Petersburg, and Niall Shanks, a pro- tank on animal issues. What “animal
what limits to place on human use of fessor of history and the philosophy of rights” means to most animal-protection
animals, here are some of the ques- science at Wichita State University, in advocates is that “animals have interests,
tions being asked: Kansas. “Each year in the United States and we don’t want to screw them.
nearly 70 million mammals . . . are ex- Most of the people in the established
Do animals have rights? pected to make the ultimate sacrifice” movement don’t consider themselves
Humans have used animals through- in laboratories “to benefit . . . humans. ‘rightists’ in that sense. They’re trying
out history for food, sport, tasks like haul- . . . “This clashes with the moral pre- to make things better.”
ing and plowing and scientific experi- sumption against inflicting suffering on But some analysts from the bio-
mentation, and most people have been one creature . . . to benefit some other medical-research community and the
comfortable with using animals, even creature.” 15 agriculture industry say that not just
when they suffer and die in the process. “If it would be absurd to give ani- some but most animal-protection ad-
Nevertheless, a persistent minority has mals the right to vote, it would be no vocates actually do favor granting an-
long questioned whether animals may less absurd to give that right to infants imals rights so broad that, if granted,
have a right to be treated with concern or to severely retarded human beings. those rights would effectively end all
for their comfort and welfare. Yet we still give equal consideration to human use of animals.
“To my mind, we shouldn’t be think- their interests,” said Princeton Univer- The Humane Society of the United
ing of monkeys as commodities, dis- sity philosophy professor Peter Singer, States has an “extremist” agenda with
posable resources” that can be the ob- author of the 1975 book, Animal Lib- regard to animal rights, although the
ject of distressing experimentation, for eration, which inspired much of the public who support the group with
example, says Mark Bernstein, a pro- modern animal-advocacy movement. donations generally don’t realize this,
fessor of philosophy and ethics at Pur- “We don’t raise them for food in over- says Trull at the Foundation for Bio-
due University in West Lafayette, Ind. crowded sheds or test household clean- medical Research. “On their Web site
“Just by virtue of their sentience, their ers on them. . . . But we do these they say they ultimately want to elim-
capacity to suffer, they should have the things to non-human animals who show inate all use of animals in research,”
minimal right to not suffer,” he says. greater abilities in reasoning than these an extreme animal-rights position,
“We don’t treat compromised human humans . . . because we have a prej- Trull says.
beings” — such as people with severe udice in favor of the view that all hu- “The possession of rights presup-
cognitive disabilities —“that way.” mans are somehow infinitely more valu- poses a moral status not attained by
Chickens, for example, “clearly have able than any animal.” 16 the vast majority of living things,” said
interests, preferences and desires and Critics of animal-protection activists University of Michigan professor of phi-
are able to act to satisfy their interests overinterpret the word “rights,” as it’s losophy Carl Cohen. “We must not
and preferences,” a fact that should used by most animal-welfare advo- infer . . . that a live being has, sim-
give them at least some “right” to moral cates, some analysts argue. ply in being alive, a ‘right’ to its life.
consideration by humans, with whom The idea of a rights-based philoso- The assertion that all animals, only be-
they share those traits, said Gary L. phy of animal protection is that “in virtue cause they are alive and have inter-
Francione, a professor of law at the of some of the properties animals have” ests, also possess the ‘right to life’ is
Rutgers University School of Law in — notably “sentience,” the ability to be an abuse of that phrase, and wholly
Newark, N.J. “When we kill these non- aware of feelings, such as pain — without warrant.” 17
humans, we frustrate their ability to “animals deserve some minimal rights,” Most people intuitively understand
enjoy the satisfaction of their interests, says Bernstein. To some critics the phrase that animals cannot have “rights” in
preferences and desires — just as we “animal rights” calls up visions of “giv- anything like the way humans do,
do when we kill humans.” 14 ing pigs driver’s licenses,” but “that’s not said Jan Narveson, a professor of
“Although it is noble” for a human the idea. It’s that animals, by virtue of philosophy at Canada’s University of
“to undergo a painful bone marrow their ability to feel, are not things to be Waterloo. For example, “most peo-
transplant to save the life of a stranger, tortured.” ple think that if we could find a
we think it would be wrong to require “You’re not talking about rights in cure for cancer by performing on
them to undergo that procedure,” but the philosophical sense” of a civil right Continued on p. 8
6 CQ Researcher
7. More Philosophers Argue for Animal Protection
Recent efforts are changing the face of the movement.
cademic philosophers have played a “major role” in the animals deserve kind and ethical treatment because they have
A development and growth of the animal-welfare move- inherent value in their own right and qualities — such as at
ment, says Bernard Unti, a historian who is senior poli- least rudimentary consciousness — that entitle them to kind
cy adviser to the chief executive officer of the Humane Society treatment because of the effect of cruelty on them, not because
of the United States. practicing cruelty has a negative effect on the human soul.
Philosophers and theologians dating back at least to the an- The philosophical shift reflects an ever-larger body of sci-
cient Greeks have sought a logical basis for the widespread entific knowledge demonstrating that humans are not as dif-
feeling that humans owe special consideration to the welfare ferent from animals as once was thought, says Kenneth Shapiro,
of animals, says Mark Bernstein, a professor of philosophy and executive director of the Animals and Society Institute, a think
ethics at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Ind. tank on animal issues in Ann Arbor, Mich.
“Virtue ethics,” a philosophical idea from the days of Aris- In the past, before the study of evolution and genetics re-
totle, basically argues that humans should refrain from animal vealed the links and similarities among species, “there was a
cruelty not really for the animals’ sake categorical distinction made between hu-
but to preserve one’s own good char- mans and animals” by most people, in-
Time Life Pictures/Getty Images/Michael Goldman
acter, Bernstein says. cluding philosophers, Shapiro says. “That
Similarly, the 18th-century German mistaken categorical divide has been an
philosopher Immanuel Kant argued underlying core problem that allows an-
that the treatment of animals matters imals to become mere property” rather
mainly because it influences the way than independent beings with feelings
we treat people. According to Kant, and interests of their own, he says. Given
“the reason we should show kind- new scientific knowledge today, howev-
ness to an old and faithful dog is that er, philosophers and the rest of us “have
doing otherwise could cause us to to reexamine animals in the same way
harden our hearts toward people,” we examined the assumptions” from a
Bernstein says. century ago that women, children and
Especially since the 1970s, how- slaves, for example, could rightly be con-
ever, a growing number of philoso- sidered men’s property to do with as
phers and theologians have advanced they would, he says.
arguments for why animal welfare The philosophical literature on con-
deserves human attention, and the temporary animal ethics “makes much
University of Arizona scientist Irene
growth in the number of academic Pepperberg spent 15 years studying the more use of scientific literature today
theorists on the matter has also intelligence of Alex, an African gray parrot. than even 10 years ago,” Bernstein says.
helped to change the face of the While a significant number of ethicists
movement, says Unti. still argue that animals themselves don’t
The influx of philosophers arguing that concerns over ani- have the inherent moral worth that requires humans to take
mal welfare have a rational basis “appealed to people who special care of their welfare, “philosophical thinking generally
weren’t comfortable with the ‘sentimental’ nature of many ear- has been moving in a much more animal-friendly direction” in
lier appeals for animal protection,” Unti says. the past 10 to 15 years, partly driven by a changing scientific
“So these philosophers were a necessary precursor to the understanding, he says.
modern movement, helping to bring a professional cadre” of For example, as evolution becomes more established as a
lawyers, veterinarians and other educated professionals — as mainstream belief, “more people are recognizing that animals
well as a growing number of men — into the ranks of ani- are continuous with human beings” in a chain of biological con-
mal activists, he says. “When somebody presents a rational nection from simpler to more complex beings, and that animals
channel” for a belief, “it helps some people to make sense of are similar to people “in the most basic way — that they enjoy
their emotions” and to embrace animal-rights activism, for ex- and suffer through experiences,” Bernstein says. “This means we
ample, because they become convinced that “these beliefs are should treat them as ends rather than as means,” as most ethical
not irrational.” philosophies enjoin us to treat humans, he says.
Unlike many earlier philosophers who speculated about an-
imal welfare, more thinkers in recent decades have argued that — Marcia Clemmitt
www.cqresearcher.com Jan. 8, 2010 7
8. ANIMAL RIGHTS
a category only applicable to beings
Many Nobel Laureates Use Animal Testing like ourselves.” 18
Many recent Nobel Prize winners in the sciences have relied on
Are we doing enough to protect
animal testing in some capacity. Many have turned to mice, while farm animals?
others have studied live sheep, pigs, frogs and dogs. Scientists widely Animal-protection activists in the
contend that animal research remains essential to scientific and United States have sought, and helped
medical progress. enact, legislation to improve the wel-
fare of farm animals since the 19th
Select Nobel Laureates century. Many activists argue, howev-
Whose Work Involved Animals er, that more regulation is needed be-
cause, as a largely meat-eating soci-
Year Laureates Animal Nature of discovery ety, we find it all too easy to ignore
involved used the harsh conditions that exist on farms,
especially as large factory farms be-
2007 Capecchi, Mouse Discovery of principles for introducing come the norm.
Evans, specific gene modifications in mice by At a hog farm that former Bush
Smithies the use of embryonic stem cells aide Scully visited, “to maximize the
2005 Marshall, Gerbil Discovery of bacterium that leads to use of space and minimize the need
Warren gastritis and peptic ulcer disease for care, the . . . 400-to-500-pound
2000 Carlsson, Mouse, Signal transduction in the nervous mammals are trapped without relief
Greengard, Guinea pig, system inside iron crates seven feet long and
Kandel sea slug 22 inches wide,” where they “chew
maniacally on bars and chains, as for-
1998 Furchgott, Rabbit Nitric oxide as signaling molecule in aging animals will do when denied
Ignarro, cardiovascular system straw . . . or else just lie there like
Murad broken beings,” wrote Scully. “The
1991 Neher, Frog Chemical communication between spirit of the place would be familiar”
Sakmann cells to police who raid outlawed “puppy
1990 Murray, Dog Organ transplantation techniques mills,” but, in the case of farm ani-
Thomas mals, in most states “the law prohibits
1989 Varmus, Chicken Viral origin of some cancer-causing none of it.” 19
Bishop genes The meat-eating public “is isolated
from the negative consequences” of
1981 Sperry, Cat, Processing of visual information by the our treatment of farm animals “through
Hubel, monkey brain our language and the packaging of
Wiesel animal products, both of which de-
1979 Cormack, Pig Development of computer-assisted emphasize the fact that we are involved
Hounsfield tomography in the abuse of living, sentient crea-
1977 Guilemin, Sheep, pig Hypothalamic hormones, chemicals tures,” wrote Emory University profes-
Schally, that help regulate some vital body sor of sociology Robert Agnew. “We
Yalow processes do not eat ‘cows’ or ‘pigs,’ but rather
‘hamburgers’ and ‘pork chops.” Adver-
Source: Foundation for Biomedical Research tising and other media often give the
impression that “most farm animals live
Continued from p. 6 to something important for us,” and contented lives in idyllic settings.” 20
thousands of monkeys in ways that “when philosophers . . . deny this “Most people know very little about
are extremely painful and later fatal . . . they go against normal intu- how animals are treated in agriculture,
to the monkeys, we should still go itions. . . . We rightly outlaw slav- and they end up supporting practices,
right ahead,” Narveson said. “Most ery.” However, “since we don’t think like the worst kind of factory farming,
people think animal experimentation animals are people, we don’t think that they would (if fully informed) view
permissible, so long as it could lead of our use of them as ‘enslavement,’ as morally unacceptable,” according to
8 CQ Researcher
9. the Project on Ani- “The livestock indus-
mal Treatment at the try has a long history
University of Chica- of supporting animal
go Law School. 21 welfare,” but that’s not
Congress has the same as the “animal-
done little to devel- rights” agenda that
op regulations for animal-advocacy groups
protecting farm ani- push, so animal activists
U.S. Department of Agriculture
mals, and the De- continue to complain,
partment of Agricul- says former Rep. Char-
ture (USDA) also has lie Stenholm, D-Texas,
“grown very close to now a senior policy ad-
the industry,” creat- viser for agricultural is-
ing “an unregulated sues at a Washington-
situation where there based law and lobbying
are basically no pro- firm. “These activist
tections for farm an- groups use the platform
imals at the federal Gestation crates severely restrict the movement of female pigs during of animal rights to ad-
level in production pregnancy. State laws are beginning to regulate treatment of farm vocate for regulations so
agriculture,” accord- animals, but federal laws apply only to the transport and slaughter of strict they will put ani-
farm animals. The nation’s largest pork producer, Smithfield Farms,
ing to Wayne Pacelle, announced it will begin phasing out gestation crates on its farms. mal agriculture out of
CEO of the Humane business, which is their
Society. real goal.”
Animal-welfare groups are not call- said Steve Kopperud, senior vice “The greatest risk right now is the
ing for unreasonable or illogical rules, president of the Washington lobby- possibility that Congress will take
says Pacelle. ing and communications firm Policy seriously the advice of people who
For example, one issue concerns the Directions, which specializes in farm have sworn never to eat meat in
“gestation crates” in which breeding and food issues. 22 crafting policy that will damage
sows are housed for much of their lives. Farm-industry groups “are com- farming,” David Martosoko, director
“They may endure seven, eight, nine, mitted to working with USDA to help of research for the food-industry-
10 successive pregnancies in a two-foot their members comply” with animal- backed advocacy group Center for
by seven-foot cage in which they can- welfare rules, said Jeremy Russell, di- Consumer Freedom, told a House
not turn around,” he says. “These are rector of communications and gov- panel in 2007. 25
curious animals that like to root around ernment relations for the National
in the mud,” and several states have Meat Association. “No discussion of Is animal research necessary to
banned the crates, and at least one large animal welfare can be complete achieve medical progress?
hog company, Smithfield, has voluntarily without a mention of the tremendous Research using live animals has
agreed to phase them out, says Pacelle. improvements that have been made long been a staple both of basic-
The phase-out should and could be over the years. . . . The industry’s science laboratories — where bio-
industrywide, however, he says. sledgehammer days are long gone,” medical scientists seek knowledge
But other analysts argue that calls and “federal inspectors, who are in about how living beings function —
for stricter controls on factory-farm packing plants continuously, enforce” and toxicology labs, where scientists
practices are really veiled calls for an the requirements of the Humane use live animals to test whether cos-
end to meat eating altogether. Slaughter Act of 1957. 23 metics, radiation, industrial chemicals
“When you peel away the rhetoric Furthermore, the association “en- and other environmental exposures
and posturing of all animal-rights courages plants to do everything are safe for humans.
groups, the bottom line is the same: possible to create calm, low-stress at- Today, toxicology laboratories are
‘You have no right to be in business. mospheres that work with — rather beginning a large-scale phase-out of
Animals should not be used for food. than against — animals’ natural in- animal testing over the next few
We’ll continue to fight to make it un- stincts,” said Russell. The U.S. meat decades. In the biomedical science
popular or uneconomical to be in industry “has embraced voluntary arena, however, debate rages over
the livestock and poultry business,’ ” humane handling” programs. 24 whether live-animal research contributes
www.cqresearcher.com Jan. 8, 2010 9
10. ANIMAL RIGHTS
enough to human welfare to justify out in humans, wrote Wichita State’s developing a neural prosthesis that
animals’ suffering and death. Shanks and Ray and Jean Greek, au- could allow a blind person to see
Biomedical scientists’ zeal to contin- thors of Sacred Cows and Golden Geese: again by means of a head-mounted
ue live-animal research “is all about get- The Human Cost of Experiments on An- camera whose images would stimu-
ting grant money, not about helping peo- imals. In the case of the drug thalido- late the brain directly, bypassing dam-
ple,” says Jerry Vlasak, a Los Angeles mide — a sedative prescribed to preg- aged eyes, says Ringach.
surgeon and leader of the North Amer- nant women in the 1950s and ’60s that “It takes years and years to devel-
ican Animal Liberation Press Office. led to the birth of children without limbs op those studies” on monkeys, “and
For example, a vision researcher at — animal tests conducted after the human my work is at least partly gone,” Ringach
UCLA has pursued research involving birth defects were discovered showed says. “Now I work with humans, who
sensors placed on the eyeballs of rhesus that the drug’s health effects varied are also animals but who can sign a
monkeys “for 19 years,” repeatedly being widely among animal species. 26 piece of paper and say they agree.
awarded grant renewals to continue the Some species showed none of the The research I’m doing with humans
project, “just because he says he’s on negative effects that thalidomide caused is completely different from what I
the verge of a great discovery,” which in humans, while others were affect- was doing before” and won’t provide
so far hasn’t come, despite nearly two ed but to a far lesser degree than hu- answers to some key questions that
decades of suffering on the part of the mans. “All the animals whose offspring must be answered before an actual vi-
monkeys, says Vlasak. exhibited” the limbless condition that sual prosthesis could be developed.
From time to time, animal experi- afflicted human babies “did so only “We need to figure out how to plant
menters “have stumbled on something after being given doses 25-150 times a device in the brain that could be in
useful,” but current experiments “aren’t the human dose,” wrote Shanks and there for years and years,” and how elec-
coming up with anything of actual value” the Greeks. Thus, biomedical scientists’ tricity in such a device would interact
for health, since basic science, by defin- hypothesis that animal research is “pre- with the brain’s own electrical signals
ition, aims at generating data and infor- dictive for humans is wrong.” 27 and with brain tissue, he says. “There’s
mation, without reference to whether that But animal-rights advocates are mere- no way you can actually develop these
information will be useful or not, says ly pitting “the simple lie” that animals are things” using only human subjects.
Vlasak. Nevertheless, the government being harmed in labs without purpose “We’re trying to test how nature works,”
funds basic-science experimentation on against “the complex truth” that experi- and in some cases there is literally no
live animals to the tune of hundreds of mentation on live animals has yielded a way to gain that knowledge without ob-
millions of dollars annually, he says. The great deal of valuable scientific knowl- serving whole animals, Ringach says.
money would be better used expanding edge, says Jacquie Calnan, president Particularly in an aging society, “one
insurance coverage to more Americans of the biomedical-research advocacy of the most explosive areas of science
— 46,000 of whom die prematurely group Americans for Medical Progress. is neuroscience,” with the public greatly
every year because of lack of care — Animal studies have been crucial in interested in finding answers to neuro-
and retooling medical practice to use al- developing treatments for many con- logical diseases of aging such as Parkin-
ready proven treatments that aren’t being ditions, says Trull of the Foundation son’s and Alzheimer’s, says Trull. Study-
used, he says. for Biomedical Research. They are ing live non-human primates is “the only
“Half the drugs that test as safe on “critical to hepatitis work,” for exam- way” to learn about this, she says.
animals turn out to not work or be ple, while both cataract surgeries and When it comes to the toxicology lab,
safe in people, so you might as well joint replacement were both pioneered which has traditionally used millions of
flip a coin” as test drugs initially on in animals, Trull says. mostly small animals to determine the
animals, Vlasak says. Dario Ringach, a professor of neuro- toxicity of chemical substances like drugs
Many opponents of live-animal re- biology and psychology at the Uni- and cosmetics, scientists now generally
search argue that studies demonstrating versity of California, Los Angeles agree with animal-welfare advocates that
that treatments are safe or effective in (UCLA), stopped his primate research animal testing should be phased out.
animals often don’t pan out when the after animal activists threatened his “The main crystallizing event” for that
same treatments are tried in human be- home, terrorizing his young children, trend was a report issued by the Na-
ings, making the research far less ef- several years ago. Ringach describes tional Academy of Sciences in 2007 that
fective in advancing actual medical his monkey studies as an examination “articulated a vision that 20 years down
knowledge than scientists claim. of “the basic way that the brain process- the line we will get to the point where
Animal studies do not reliably pre- es information from the eyes” that might we use no or virtually no animals” to
dict how medical treatments will pan have served as preliminary work for Continued on p. 12
10 CQ Researcher
11. Chronology
the Naval Weapons Center in 2008
1950s-1970s
Federal laws are enacted to
China Lake, Calif., and pays to Federal agents shut down a Cali-
relocate the animals. . . . PETA fornia slaughterhouse after under-
protect some farm animals, co-founder Alex Pacheco secretly cover video shows workers abusing
pets and laboratory animals. photographs filthy conditions for sick cattle, but a government audit
monkeys at Institute of Behavioral finds no evidence that slaughter-
1954 Research in Silver Spring, Md. house inspection in the nation is
Humane Society of the United States inadequate. . . . California ballot
is founded to apply advocacy tech- 1985 initiative bans confinement of veal
niques developed by local animal- Congress amends AWA to require calves, hens and brood sows in
welfare groups to national issues. animal-research labs to provide cages that don’t allow them to turn
exercise for dogs and companion- freely, lie down, stand up and ex-
1958 ship for nonhuman primates, as tend their limbs.
Federal Humane Slaughter Act re- well as mental stimulation like
quires mammals killed for food to toys and opportunities to forage 2009
be completely stunned before for food. China contemplates its first ani-
being dismembered. mal-welfare law, requiring regis-
• tration and vaccination of pets
1966 and banning pet maltreatment. . . .
Allegations that pet dogs are being Ohio voters back an agriculture
kidnapped for research spark en-
actment of federal Animal Welfare
2000s State laws and
ballot initiatives target animal
industry-sponsored constitutional
amendment barring legislators
Act (AWA), requiring humane treat- cruelty on farms. and voters from enacting animal-
ment by dealers who sell dogs welfare rules that apply to farms.
and cats to laboratories. 2000 . . . National retailer J.C. Penney
After a PETA hidden-camera inves- stops selling fur products, after
1976 tigation, workers at a North Caroli- years of protests by activists. . . .
AWA is expanded to cover animal na hog farm receive the first-ever U.S. biomedical scientists join
fighting. felony convictions handed out for with Pro-Test, a United Kingdom-
farm abuses, including skinning based group, to seek public sup-
1979 animals alive and sawing off the port for animal research. . . .
San Francisco attorney Joyce Tis- legs of a conscious animal. Ban on animal testing for cos-
chler founds Animal Legal Defense metics takes effect in European
Fund (ALDF). 2005 Union. . . . NFL quarterback
World Organization for Animal Michael Vick is signed by
• Health adopts guidelines for the Philadelphia Eagles after serving
humane transport and slaughter of 18 months in prison on a 2007
food animals. conviction for operating a dog-
1980s-1990s
Animal-protection advocates
fighting ring; he vows to work
with the Humane Society to edu-
2006
spar with biomedical researchers Federal Animal Enterprise Terror- cate the public about the cruelty
over study of live animals. ism Act sets tough penalties for of animal fighting. . . Several
activists who commit or threaten states pass tough new animal-
1980 violence against animal-using orga- protection laws: amputation of
PETA — People for the Ethical nizations, such as factory and fur dairy cows’ tails banned (Califor-
Treatment of Animals — is founded farms and university research labs. nia); felonies enacted for animal
in Norfolk, Va. cruelty (Arkansas) and cockfighting
2007 (Kansas); larger cages required for
1981 Congress makes violation of AWA breed sows and veal calves
Settling a case brought by ALDF, animal-fighting provisions a felony (Maine); 24-hour-a-day tethering
the Navy halts the planned slaugh- punishable by up to three years of dogs and short chains and
ter of thousands of wild burros at in prison. choke collars banned (Nevada).
www.cqresearcher.com Jan. 8, 2010 11
12. ANIMAL RIGHTS
Violent Animal Activists in the Minority
Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act set tough penalties.
he 2000s saw an uptick in activist violence directed at as possible — fruit flies, for example, rather than mice —
T biomedical researchers who use live animals in experi-
ments, with the highest-profile incidents occurring at the
University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA).
“while still making the research relevant” to humans, and also
“to minimize the number of animals used,” he says.
Today, research on large animals, especially, is only under-
Some of the activists adopted a tactic regularly used by anti- taken in order to study the most important biological systems,
abortion activists — posting the names, photos and contact in- Ringach says. “Competition for grant funds is extremely diffi-
formation of scientists on the Internet, enabling sympathizers cult,” with only about 10 percent of grants funded, so scien-
to anonymously plan protests and harass specific scientists. tists who get funding are almost by definition working on high-
In the early 2000s, a group of UCLA students published con- priority science, whose ultimate value for human health makes
tact information for several university personnel, including Dario it vital. “If you’re proposing to look at Botox, those studies
Ringach, a UCLA professor of neurobiology and psychology who aren’t going to get funded,” he says.
formerly conducted vision research on live monkeys. Although When Ringach’s monkey lab was in operation, his experi-
university administrators fairly quickly dissuaded the student group mental animals were treated humanely, he says. “What people
from continuing the postings, by that time activists outside the would have seen in the lab is what you would see in a human
university had the information, Ringach says. surgery suite, an animal anesthetized, with his skin opened,
“People showed up at our home at night, wearing ski masks, and electrodes in the brain. I can show you the same kind of
20 to 40 of them, banging on the windows” and vandalizing thing in an epileptic [human] patient,” he says. The monkey
property. “My kids” — ages 3 and 6 when the protests began would receive “very similar drugs and monitoring on the table”
— “were crying every night,” says Ringach, who abandoned to what a human would receive. “But if you don’t understand
his research in 2006. “Their goal was to terrorize my family, what’s happening” in those surgeries — animal or human —
and they succeeded.” “the sights will shock you,” he says.
Between 2006 and 2008 violence and threats escalated Outside the surgical suite, monkeys were housed in pairs
against other UCLA employees who worked with animals. Three and in groups, in accordance with their being “very social an-
incendiary devices were left near faculty homes, and a re- imals,” Ringach says. They had toys to play with and TV to
searcher received a package rigged with razor blades. 1 watch because, like all primates, they need mental stimulation,
In 2009, the university won a court injunction prohibiting a need that the 1985 Animal Welfare Act (AWA) amendments
three animal-rights groups and five individuals from coming codified into a legal requirement for labs, Ringach says.
within 50 feet of the residences of UCLA scientists who do an- But some animal activists say that the AWA rules are a smoke-
imal research or posting personal information about UCLA per- screen behind which the inherent intolerable cruelty of animal
sonnel on the Web. 2 research lurks. “Anyone knowledgeable considers the Animal
Despite activists’ complaint that all animal research is cruel and Welfare Act completely useless,” says Jerry Vlasak, a Los Angeles-
unjustified, the vast majority of American biomedical researchers based surgeon and a leader of the activist group North Ameri-
who experiment on live animals today take animals’ welfare into can Animal Liberation Press Office. “It doesn’t cover farm ani-
account, even as they pursue experiments vital for developing mals or rodents, and even for those animals that it does cover
knowledge of how living bodies function, Ringach argues. there are exceptions” for occasions when it’s considered ac-
“The notion that people walk into a lab and say, ‘Hey, today ceptable to impose pain and suffering in the lab, he says.
I’m going to blowtorch a monkey’ is just nonsense.” For one In 2004, Vlasak made international headlines when he declared,
thing, federal rules require scientists to use as simple a species “I don’t think you’d have to kill too many [researchers]” to end
Continued from p. 10 methods for drugs and chemicals that
test the toxicity of chemicals and other
products, says Paul Locke, an associate
professor of environmental health sci-
use human cells grown in the lab rather
than live animals.
“Animal testing is time-consuming,
BACKGROUND
ences at the Johns Hopkins University expensive and doesn’t always relate to
Bloomberg School of Public Health. what is toxic in humans,” and “this Early Farm Laws
Under a new government program really has the potential to revolutionize
the way toxic chemicals are identified,” hilosophers as far back as Aris-
launched in the report’s wake, several
federal agencies will cooperate to re-
search and develop toxicity-testing
said Francis Collins, director of the Na-
tional Institutes of Health (NIH). 28
P totle have mused on whether
humans have an ethical responsibility
12 CQ Researcher
13. AFP/Getty Images/India Today Group/Subir Halder
animal research. “I think for penalties for threats and vio-
five lives, 10 lives, 15 human lent acts against academic or
lives, we could save a million, commercial organizations that
2 million, 10 million non- use or sell animals or animal
human lives.” 3 products. The law “has increased
He continues to stand by communication among law
that principle. enforcement agencies” about
In recent years, “many animal-rights protesters and
have come to view the strug- helped head off more actions
gle for animal liberation as like the ones against UCLA,
being on a par with other says Frankie Trull, founder and
liberation struggles,” such as Activists from People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals president of the Washington-
the fights to end apartheid (PETA), their bodies painted as monkeys, protest against based Foundation for Bio-
in South Africa and slavery animal research in New Delhi, India, on Nov. 25, 2009. medical Research.
in the United States, says But Vlasak says AETA was
Vlasak. In history “no oppressors have ever given in without a a sign that animal-using groups are beginning to understand
struggle,” with the result that a wide variety of tactics, including that there is growing public pressure for them to change their
“civil disobedience and acts of violence,” have been part of all ways, not just from activists who threaten violence but from
liberation battles when the occasion demands it, he says. the public at large, who increasingly express interest in ani-
While peaceful protests, legal strategies and legislative ad- mal welfare in polls. “Any time you see an oppressor pass
vocacy have a place, no liberation struggle totally committed laws, your action is having an effect,” he says.
to nonviolence could succeed, Vlasak says. “Martin Luther King Most animal-protection supporters, however, take pains to
and the peaceful changes that he made would have gotten distance themselves from any activism that involves harassment
nowhere unless the oppressors knew that the alternative to or violence. “It’s a distortion” to point to the actions of a few ex-
dealing with him was to deal with” activists who were willing tremists, such as the UCLA protesters, as a sign that the animal-
to commit violence, such as the Black Panther Party. advocacy movement as a whole is extreme, says Kenneth Shapiro,
Scientists who are targeted by extremists don’t get much executive director of the Animals and Society Institute, an Ann
support, says Ringach. When he contacted the National Insti- Arbor, Mich.-based think tank. “The movement is very peace-
tutes of Health — the federal agency that funds most basic ful compared to most liberation movements” and fully accepts
biomedical research — he was told, “ ‘We’re not really an advo- the need for change to be gradual, he says.
cacy group.’ When you actually try to talk to the top leadership
of NIH, the bottom line is that somebody on the appropriations — Marcia Clemmitt
committee” in Congress may take exception to the agency’s
championing animal research, which has many foes among the 1 Phil Hampton, “Judge Expands Order to Block Harassment of Researchers,”
public, and the agency is very reluctant to be vocal in support press release, University of California, Los Angeles, April 22, 2008,
http://newsroom.ucla.edu.
of its grantees, he says. 2 Ibid.
In 2006, President George W. Bush signed into law the An- 3 Quoted in Jamie Doward, “Kill Scientists, Says Animal Rights Chief,” The
imal Enterprise Terrorism Act (AETA), setting substantial new Guardian, July 25, 2004, www.guardian.co.uk.
to treat animals well. It wasn’t until mon in physiology labs at least es cholera did not sicken and die
the 19th century, however, that the since the 17th century — were help- but thrived instead. 30
modern animal-welfare movement ing to expand knowledge of biol- “The physiologist is not an ordinary
coalesced into a large-scale public ogy. In 1879, for example, French man: he is a scientist possessed and
movement. 29 chemist Louis Pasteur discovered absorbed by the scientific idea he pur-
Some of the earliest clashes be- that vaccinating animals with weak- sues,” wrote French physiologist Claude
tween animal-welfare advocates and ened disease-causing microbes gave Bernard. “He does not hear the cries
users of animals involved scien- them immunity to future infection, of animals, he does not see their flow-
tists. In 19th-century Europe, ex- after a flock of chickens he’d in- ing blood, he sees nothing but his
periments on live animals — com- jected with the bacteria that caus- idea, and is aware of nothing but an
www.cqresearcher.com Jan. 8, 2010 13
14. ANIMAL RIGHTS
organism that conceals from him the
problem he is seeking to resolve.” 30
But while some animal experi-
mentation undeniably advanced
human knowledge in important ways,
many in the public worried about
the suffering and death that some
researchers, like Bernard, were will-
ing to impose on animals to satisfy
scientific curiosity.
In Bernard’s laboratory “we sacri-
ficed daily from one to three dogs,
besides rabbits and other animals,
and after four months’ experience
I am of the opinion that not one
AFP/Getty Images/Steve Helber-Pool
of those experiments . . . was jus-
tified or necessary,” a retired British
Navy officer wrote to a London
newspaper of his experience work-
ing with Bernard. 32
Growing public discomfort with an-
imal suffering, in laboratories and else-
where, led to the first attempts to
squelch abuse by law. In 1810 and
1811, England’s lord high chancellor
attempted but failed to pass bills gen-
erally banning “wanton and malicious
cruelty to animals.” 33 In 1822, the
British Parliament passed Martin’s Act,
outlawing the infliction of unnecessary
cruelty or suffering on a few domesti-
cated animals — cattle, oxen, horses
and sheep. 34
In the United States, the earliest
animal-protection law was the so-
AFP/Getty Images/Al Bello
called 28-hour law, limiting confine-
ment of farm animals in a train car
while being transported across coun-
try, says historian Bernard Unti, se-
nior policy adviser and special as-
sistant to the Humane Society’s
Pacelle.
As farming shifted from a local to
Cruelty Perpetrators in the Spotlight a national industry, “people saw with
their own eyes the animals going
Then-Atlanta Falcons quarterback Michael Vick pleaded guilty to a federal
through their towns on the train,” and
dogfighting charge in 2007 and served 18 months in prison (top). He
the beasts’ plight inspired sympathy,
now speaks out against cruelty to animals and has returned to
says Unti. Enacted in 1873, the law
professional football . Spectators cheer on the opening night of the cockfighting
season at the Coliseo Central De Barranquitas in Barranquitas, Puerto required that for every 28 hours of
Rico (bottom). Heavy betting occurs before and during the fights. Cockfighting transport, animals must be offloaded
is legal in Puerto Rico but a felony in some states. to eat, drink and have at least five
hours of rest.
14 CQ Researcher