Supreme Court rules: Animal sacrifice ban overturned; VERDICT DOES NOT AFFECT ANTICRUELTY LAWS

July 1, 1993 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, July/August 1993:

WASHINGTON D.C.––Anticruelty laws were unaffected by a June 11 United States

Supreme Court verdict that overturned a ban on animal sacrifice imposed in 1987 by the city of

Hialeah, Florida. The Supreme Court unanimously held that although governments do have the

authority to enforce prohibitions on cruelty, the keeping of livestock, and violations of zoning,

the set of six ordinances enacted in Hialeah were unconstitutional because they were adopted in

Supreme Court did not okay animal sacrifice

July 1, 1993 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, July/August 1993:

by Gary L. Francione and Anna E. Charlton
Animal Rights Law Center

On June 11, 1993, the Supreme Court issued its decision concerning animal sacrifice in Church of the Lukumi Babalu Aye, Inc. v. City of Hialeah. The next day, most major newspapers carried headlines proclaiming that the Court had held that animal sacrifice is protected by the First Amendment freedom of religion clause. Typical of those proclamations was the one splashed across the entire front cover of New York Newsday: “Top Court OKs Animal Sacrifice.” Reading the comments of major humane organizations in reaction to the decision, including those such as the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals which have the police power to stop the infliction of cruelty on animals, we have been distressed to realize that the decision has been read far too broadly, and that
there is the mistaken impression that humane officers are now powerless to stop the brutalities of animal sacrifice. The Court’s opinion in Lukumi was somewhat convoluted and was confused by current disagreement among Justices concerning how the constitutional guarantee of the free exercise of religion should be interpreted. In light of these misunderstandings, we have offered the resources of the Animal Rights Law Center to assist municipalities and concerned individuals to assess their options for working to protect animals from sacrifice.

Help stop roadkills

July 1, 1993 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, July/August 1993:

DERRY, N.H., CHARLOTTE, Vt., and

SHUSHAN, N.Y.––You too can help prevent roadkills, by

taking a copy of the survey form on page 7 of this issue with

you the next time you go walking.

Every roadkill you record will help in a concerted

effort to identify the characteristics of “killing zones” that

attract multiple roadkills, and help as well to develop a

defensive defensive driving curriculum that could save mil-

lions of animal lives.

Two parallel but cooperating teams are collecting

roadkill observations: a nationwide network of middle

school students assembled by environmental science teacher

Brewster Bartlett of Pinkerton Academy in Derry, New

Hampshire, and the readers of Country Life magazine and

ANIMAL PEOPLE.

NEW DIRECTION FOR AMERICANS FOR MEDICAL PROGRESS ––OR MORE OF THE SAME?

July 1, 1993 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, June 1993:

Americans for Medical Progress has posted a reward of $5,000 for information leading to the arrest

and conviction of whoever vandalized the homes and cars of five federally funded researchers on April 28. Although the names of the researchers were not officially disclosed, one is believed to be Sharon Juliano, whose experiments on cats have been subject of numerous protests held in front of her home and elsewhere in her neighborhood.

AMP was founded by three executives of U.S. Surgical Corporation, specifically to attack the animal

rights movement––and U.S. Surgical, whose laboratory use of dogs has been target of annual demonstrations by Friends of Animals for 13 years, donated $980,000 of the $985,000 AMP raised in 1991. (1992 financial data isn’t yet available.) However, AMP refrained from any mention of animal issues in a May 14 full-page ad in The New York Times, which depicted Marie Curie and suggested that the purpose of the organization is to “bring the story of medical science––and medical heroes––to young Americans.”

CHILDREN AND ANIMALS

June 1, 1993 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, June 1993:

Shakira Hemphill, Michael Mims, Robert Ronnell Jones, and LaTroy Eugene Murphy, all of

Abram Simon Elementary School in Washington D.C., on April 29 shared the American Humane Association’s first-

ever Be Kind To Animals Kid Award for their part in bringing to justice an off-duty police officer whom they witnessed in

the act of severely beating a dog. All four witnessed the beating on May 2, 1992. Jones, a third grader at the time,

approached the man and demanded an explanation. As the abuse continued, he ran up and down the street to keep an

eye on the dog, whom the man eventually dragged into an alley, while the others called the Washington Humane

Society. All four then pointed the abuser out to the WHS cruelty officer who responded to their call. The dog was

impounded, but was returned to the owner on June 15, who claimed to have given her away one week later. A grand

jury declined to indict, leaving any punitive action up to the Washington D.C. police department division of internal

affairs. As the nominating shelter for the AHA award winners, WHS received $1,000 worth of dog food from Advanced

Nutrition Cycle.

New pocket (gopher and bat) books

June 1, 1993 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, June 1993:

Conversations With A Pocket Gopher

And Other Outspoken Neighbors. By Jack

Schaefer. Capra Press (PO Box 2068, Santa Barbara,

CA 93120), 1978, 1992, 126 pages, paper $8.95.

Originally published in Audubon magazine, the

seven tales collected here attempt to explain ecological situ-

ations from the perspectives of individual nonhuman beings.

The late author, best known for his Western novel Shane,

deserves credit for trying, though his style too often

becomes precious and archaic when he strives hardest for

enlightenment.

VIVISECTION

June 1, 1993 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, June 1993:

Cruelty charges against Dr. Florintino

Sanguinetti, director of the Hospital de Clinicas Jose de

San Martin in Buenos Aires, Argentina, may be dropped

soon because the judge assigned to the case has failed to

schedule a prosecution, according to the Asociacion para la

Defensa de los Derechos del Animal. The case made inter-

national headlines in March 1990 when judge Omar Faciuto

joined ADDA in a visit to the hospital dog laboratory, and

found numerous dogs confined in tiny, poorly ventilated

cages, amid heaps of their own excrement. Faciuto imme-

diately ordered that the dogs be removed and the laboratory

be closed. It was the first time anyone in Argentina had

closed a laboratory via the courts. But that’s where the

action stopped. As of March 17, ADDA urgently requested

that letters be addressed to: Sr. Juez de lra. Instancia

Hunting & Fishing

June 1, 1993 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, June 1993:

Fed up with poachers, the Plaquemines Parish,

Lousiana district attorney’s office two years ago began

offering people convicted of hunting and fishing offenses

the option of contributing to an equipment fund to help

game wardens in lieu of paying higher fines. The 1991

receipts bought walkie-talkies and a video camera.

Receipts rose to $5,125 in 1992, and were mostly spent on

a $4,000 night vision scope, to detect jacklighters.

The Lousiana House of Representatives on

May 14 killed a bill to require hunters under 16 to pass a

gun safety class.

Allen Sarratt, of Camden, Tennessee, killed

his son Brent, 12, and daughter Kelly, 15, with a single

shot on May 17 when he slung his loaded deer rifle over his

shoulder as he started down the steps of their home and it

discharged.

FUR

June 1, 1993 Dylan Forest Leave a comment

From ANIMAL PEOPLE, June 1993:

Someone used rat poison in late

April to kill more than 17,000 mink at

the Sakhalin Fur Industrial Association fur

farm on Sakhalin Island in the former

Soviet Union. The fur farm claimed a loss

of $2.8 million, although at current world

pelt prices the actual loss was probably

closer to $400,000. Possible suspects

include rival fur entrepreneurs trying to

boost prices for their own pelts by creating

a shortage and simultaneously wiping out a

rival; someone in management attempting

to cash in on the limited insurance cover-

age; and/or disgruntled employees.

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