You may find his argument as persuasive as I did. If you have an interest, I highly suggest you read it. I can't do justice to Wilson's detailed, 70-page argument in this space. "Whatever rights and interests Happy may have do not tell us anything about the rights my dog has," Wilson writes, later adding "that we should recognize Happy’s right to petition for her liberty not just because she is a wild animal who is not meant to be caged and displayed, but because the rights we confer on others define who we are as a society." Courts, he argues, are sophisticated enough to recognize that wild animals are not the same as their domesticated counterparts.
You can therefore understand DiFiore's concern that a ruling in Happy's favor would have significant consequences for agriculture and might even, as she puts it, "call into question the very premises underlying pet ownership." Get the story behind Chris Churchill’s latest columns. Pigs, for example, are emotionally complex animals and yet many millions are suffering at this very moment in factories that pretend to be farms. Of course, Happy is hardly the only sentient animal in confinement. As Wilson writes: "Today, a pediatrician who suspects that a child has been abused must report her suspicion a veterinarian who suspects that an animal has been abused must do the same and the abusers of either are subject to criminal prosecution." He also rejects that the case is about, as commonly framed, whether Happy counts legally as a person.Īfter all, with laws against animal abuse we already acknowledge that it isn't just human beings who deserve some level of legal protection. The comparison is uncomfortable - Chief Judge Janet DiFiore, writing for the majority, calls it "odious" - but Wilson stresses that the point isn't to equate enslaved humans or women with elephants. The implication is immediately clear: For long stretches of American history, as Wilson details, minority groups and women were denied legal rights, and yet forward-looking courts, including the New York Court of Appeals, granted habeas corpus to members who were unjustly and inhumanly confined. Judge Wilson opens his dissent - it was a 5-2 ruling - with the stunning and sickening story of Ota Benga, a member of the Mbuti people who was put on display at the Bronx Zoo in the early 1900s, behind iron bars. The nonprofit believes the legal principle of habeas corpus, which protects people from illegal confinement, should be extended to Happy and some other animals. The Nonhuman Rights Project, which brought the case, wants Happy moved to a sanctuary where she'd have room to roam. "Her captivity is inherently unjust and inhumane." Self-determinative, autonomous elephant in the wild," writes Judge Jenny Rivera, in a dissent separate from Wilson's. "She is held in an environment that is unnatural to her and does not allow her to live her life as she was meant to: as a The Wildlife Conservation Society, which runs the zoo, insists Happy is, well, happy but given the social and emotional needs of elephants it reasonable to have doubts. At roughly 50 years old, she lives alone in a 1-acre pen, near another elephant but separate. Whether Happy's life is better today is an open question. I can't speak for Happy, but it was a degraded existence for such a majestic, intelligent animal. In those days, thankfully bygone, the zoo's elephants were made to perform tricks and stunts, including tug-of-war competitions with college football teams. In 1977, she was purchased by the Bronx Zoo and brought to its Elephant House. Andrew Cuomo, makes a compelling and powerful case that his colleagues were thinking too small and ignoring the flow of legal history.īefore we get to that, some words about Happy: She was born a wild elephant yet captured at a young age and brought to the United States.
Judge Rowan Wilson, nominated in 2017 by former Gov. But this is one of those court decisions where the real action, legally speaking, is found in the dissent.