The Politics of Animal Law: Lessons Learned From the Environmental Law Movement

• Author: Ralph A. DeMeo & Bonnie Malloy
• Pages: 43-65

43

Chapter 2:

The Politics of Animal Law:

Lessons Learned From the

Environmental Law Movement

Ralph A. DeMeo and Bonnie Malloy

I. Overview of Signicant Federal Environmental Laws ............................45

II. Overview of Federal Animal Law and the Animal Law

Movement .............................................................................................51

III. Case Studies of Animal Law Challenges ................................................58

A. Dog Fighting ..................................................................................58

B. Pet Overpopulation ........................................................................ 60

IV. Lessons Learned ....................................................................................62

In 1962, the environmental scientist and author Rachel Carson wrote the

seminal work Silent Spring, which provided a wake-up c all to acknowl-

edge the earth’s fragile ecosystems and the threats they face from human

activities. As Carson wrote:

e history of life on earth has been a history of interaction bet ween living

things and their sur roundings. To a larg e extent, the physic al form and the

habits of the earth’s vege tation and its a nimal life have been molded by the

environment. Considering the whole span of ea rthly time, the opposite eect

in which life actually modies its surround ings, has been relatively slight.

Only within the moment of time represented by the present c entu ry has one

species—man —acquired signi cant power to alter the nature of his world.

During the past quarter centur y this power has not only increased to one of

disturbing ma gnitude, but it has changed in charac ter. e most a larming of

all man’s assaults upon the environment is the contamination of air, earth, riv-

ers, and sea with dangerous and even lethal materia ls. is pollution is for the

most part irrecoverable; the chai n of evil it initiates not only in the world that

must support life, but in living tis sues is for the more part irreversible. In this

now universa l contamination of the environment, chemic als are the sinister

44 What Can Animal Law Learn From Environmental Law?

and little recog nized partners of radiat ion i n changing the very natu re of the

world—the very nature of its l ife.1

Carson’s book dra matically and disturbingly recognized the interdepen-

dency among all life and the environment. Her message in 1962 regarding

the challenges that all life on earth faces is sadly even truer today. In ma ny

ways, the same can be sa id for the challenges facing a nimal law.

Modern environmenta l law in the United States began in t he 1970s a s

an outgrow th of the “ecology” movement. Af ter initially foc using on toxic

chemicals’ eects on bi rds and other wildlife i n surfac e waters, environ-

mental law expanded its focus to include contamination of air, ground-

water, soils and ot her media, a s well as the eects of such chemicals on

human health. At every step in the evolution of environmental law, busi-

ness, industry, and even government opposed t he environmental protec-

tion movement. Today, 53 years after Rachel Carson warned about the

eects of pesticide s on wildlife, ideological battles still wa ge over cli mate

change, hyd raulic fracturin g, coal mining and combustion, factory farm

waste, spent nuclear fuel stora ge, and other controversial issues aect ing

the environment. In much the s ame way, animal law, which i s perhaps

at a sta ge of development where environmenta l law wa s 30 or 40 years

ago, faces challenges in a chieving legal and political legitimacy. Animal

welfare advocates struggle to promote their agendas in the face of often

erce opposition from hunters, ag ricultural i nterests, food manufact urers,

pharmac eutical companies, g un owners, factory farmers , and government

agencies. e batt les that environmentalist and a nimal wel fare advocates

have faced reect society’s deep divisions on these issues.

is chapter reviews animal advocates’ eorts to eectuate change on

national, state, and local levels, and analyzes the politica l, economic, and

social cha llenges that aect and dene animal law. Part I provides a survey

of signicant environmental laws that have been implemented with vary-

ing degrees of success in t he United States. Part II provides a survey of t he

animal law movement by looking at the federal legal landscape. Part III

then explores two c ase stud ies at the national level and in Florida, and the

response of local governments. ese case studies illustrate the changing, yet

recurring, challenges that animal law faces and what animal law can lea rn

from environmental law.

1. R C, S S 5-6 (1962).