Animal Law: Home

"We need another and a wiser and perhaps a more mystical concept of animals... We patronize them for their incompleteness, for their tragic fate of having taken form so far below ourselves. And therein we err, and greatly err. For the animal shall not be measured by man. In a world older and more complete than ours they move finished and complete, gifted with extensions of the senses we have lost or never attained, living by voices we shall never hear. They are not brethren, they are not underlings; they are other nations, caught with ourselves in the net of life and time, fellow prisoners of the splendour and travail of the earth."

~Henry Beston, The Outermost House, 1928

• American Bar Association, Animal Law Committee
• American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals
• Animal Law Coalition
• Animal Law Resource Center
• Animal Legal & Historical Web Center
• Animal Legal Defense Fund
• Animal Rights in the Human Legal System
• Center for Animal Law Studies, Lewis & Clark Law School
• Center for Animals and Public Policy, Tufts University
• Defenders of Wildlife
• Factory Farm Map
• Humane Society of the United States
• Moral Status of Animals
• National Association for Biomedical Research, Animal Law Section
• National Center for Prosecution of Animal Abuse
• People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals
• Pet-Abuse.Com
• SSRN Animal Law eJournal

Animal law is the body of law involving human intereaction with non-human animals, a relationship that goes back to prehistoric times.  As companions, commodities, edibles, assistants, performers, sacrifices, experimental media, animals were historically considered property and as such, human indifference  and greed often resulted in cruel fates for those animals.

Happily, times and sensibilities are changing.  "The rise of animal protection laws in the United States over the last several decades is mainly a response by legislators to the heightened concerns of Americans about animal welfare, especially that of their pet dogs and cats.  People also became worried about the treatment of animals used in laboratories...and highly social and intelligent wild species..." --Jordan Curnutt, Animals and the Law (2001)

"Animal law can touch on all aspects of civil and criminal law.  However, it is more than that;  there is usually a passion for the well-being of animals that drives human interests.   For many, this passion ripens into a belief that animals deserve more respect than is reflected in the present legal system.  The law currently does not fulfill what many of us believe is an obligation to the animals sharing our lives and our world."  -- David Favre, Michigan Bar Journal (2013)

Here is your hands-down best starting place for information on animal law!  Federal and state laws with summaries and direct links, cases, local ordinances, pending bills & legislation, organized by jurisdiction and by animal species.   Administrative law by topic and world law by country are also Full-site search, maps & comparative tables of state laws, of state laws, News, new cases and topics, and a FAQ section all contribute to making this site both comprehensive and extremely useful.
                                                                                          Check it out by clicking here!                                                 

 "The question is not  'Can they reason?'  nor  'Can they talk?'  but,  'Can they suffer?' "

 Jeremy Bentham, The Principles of Morals and Legislation (1789)

• abuse
• fighting & gambling
• entertainment industry
• factory farming
• hoarding
• fur trade
• strays
• circuses & zoos
• veterinary medicine
• slaughterhouses
• hunting and fishing
• laboratory testing & research
• endangered & threatened species
• whaling
• landlord & tenant
• pet wills & trusts
• pet custody in divorce
• wildlife
• global warming
• pollution
• pet food
• pet industry
• animal  trafficking