Much ado about the legal status of pets
Veterinary profession, industry would be heavily affected by changes.
Readers of this blog are aware of my fondness for the Wall Street Journal, so it will come as no surprise that today’s blog is triggered by an April 14 Wall Street Journal guest article by author David Grimm: “Should Pets Have the Same Legal Rights as People?” Grimm is the author of a new, heavily publicized book, Citizen Canine (PublicAffairs, 2014), and is featured in recent interviews in Wired and National Geographic.
The issue has been around for decades, but the buzz is picking up as to whether modern society needs to reconsider how political systems and courts treat animals. Last year the Nonhuman Rights Project filed a lawsuit in New York on behalf of four chimpanzees contending that they should be legally recognized as people. The Texas Supreme Court recently reversed a lower court’s ruling that had thrown out the common law classification of animals as personal property for purposes of legal damages.