Egg production, pet owner ‘fairness’ and state freedoms
Two bills affecting veterinarians may have tanked because of their redundancy.
At about the same time that the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) and United Egg Producers (UEP) announced the end of their ill-fated partnership, U.S. Rep. Jim Matheson (D-Utah) introduced H.R. 4023 in Congress to little fanfare. This bill is the 2014 version of the self-styled Fairness to Pet Owners Act—H.R. 1406 in the last legislative session. So what do we make of this? While neither action on its face had anything to do with the other, in some manner their fates were linked. Let’s explore.
After losing battles in 2011 to impose cage-free standards for egg production in the Oregon and Washington state legislatures, HSUS rose from political ashes and stunned the animal welfare and food animal universe by announcing its alliance with UEP. The two organizations helped introduce federal legislation to impose not cage-free standards but enriched colony standards—standards that closely resembled those HSUS had opposed in the states.