Lawyer Leads Fight For Animal Rights

[Guest guest]

Lawyer Leads Fight For Animal Rights `I Know It's Easy To Make Fun Of What I Do'

 

Source: The Commercial Appeal Memphis, TN

Publication date: Feb 04, 2000

 

A floppy-eared dog takes the stand, paws his collar for air and with a knowing

guilt eyes Exhibit

A: a chewed-up shoe.

 

The caption: " Coming soon to a courtroom near you . . . The burgeoning field of

animal law. "

 

The cartoon lampoons Steven Wise's life's work yet it's one of his favorites.

And if the Needham, Mass., lawyer succeeds in persuading courts to grant animals

the same legal rights as people, what now seems farcical could become a fact of

legal life.

 

" I know it's easy to make fun of what I do, " said Wise, who doesn't discount the

prospect of animals actually testifying in courtrooms. " It's a good thing,

though, I have a sense of humor. "

 

But for the longtime animal-rights activist it's no laughing matter. Neither is

it for Harvard Law School. Long a fringe subject, Wise has begun lecturing

Harvard law students on animal-rights law.

 

Wise and attorneys from around the country have recently set out to expand

existing laws that protect animals from cruelty.

 

Through lawsuits and scholarships drawing on scientific developments that show

animals have far higher levels of cognition than previously thought, the lawyers

are trying to raze the legal wall distinguishing people from animals. Unlike

people, animals are now considered property and have no rights.

 

But the animal-rights movement has made progress in the past decade. In 1994,

all but six states considered cruelty to animals a misdemeanor and punished it

with small fines and short jail sentences. Today, at least 27 states consider

the violations felonies and set fines as high as $100,000 and prison terms as

long as 10 years.

 

Critics of the animal-law movement, which include people in the pharmaceutical

industry and livestock groups, often deride animal law as the brainchild of

tree-hugging, fur-loathing vegetarians. They worry that serious legal reforms

could wreak havoc on courts, jeopardize medical tests that use animals, and set

dangerous precedents that could lead to legal limits on everything from plucking

fruit off trees to breathing in bacteria.

 

" The concern is not so much that a class is being offered; it's just the

implications of what is being taught, " said Kay Johnson, vice president of the

Animal Industry Foundation, a national livestock and poultry group. " It could be

very dangerous to open loopholes allowing people to sue on behalf of animals. "

 

Despite Johnson and other critics' concerns, animal law is an increasingly

popular class. About a dozen law schools offer classes in animal law, including

the University of Vermont, Georgetown University, and the University of

California at Los Angeles.

 

" Student interest in this subject has brought it to the forefront of our

attention, " said Alan Ray, assistant dean for academic affairs at Harvard Law

School. " The scholarship in this area has been growing in the last few years and

students took an active role in researching background on faculty. "

 

The students starting Wise's class are not in for an effortless elective,

either.

 

The 49-year-old professor, who has taught animal law at Vermont Law School and

Tufts School of Veterinary Medicine, has prepared an eight-page syllabus that

will compel students to consider everything from what it means to be an animal

to why humans deserve moral rights while " nonhuman " animals don't.

 

Wise, a former president of the Animal Legal Defense Fund who last month

published " Rattling the Cage: Toward Legal Rights for Animals, " will also take

his students through the mounting animal case law, which include recent court

victories such as a federal appeals court decision in 1998 to give a zoo visitor

the right to sue so chimpanzees are not left alone in a cage.

 

Rummaging through stacks of journal and newspaper articles in his book-lined

basement, as his cat, Alice, paws across his shoulders, Wise explains how he

plans to persuade courts to bolster animal rights.

 

Before pushing the boundary with dolphins, dogs and cats, he hopes courts will

accept his arguments that chimpanzees should have rights to bodily integrity and

liberty, meaning it would violate the law to restrict their movement or conduct

tests on primates.

 

Eventually, he hopes courts will ban such practices as required euthanasia for

dogs that bite people and other severe reprisals against wayward pets.

 

" These are not trifling issues, " he said. " People care about animals. Pets are

often considered family. There is still a lot of work to do. "

 

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