Chambliss blocks regulatory pick over animal lawsuits

by Alexander Bolton
06/28/09

Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.) has blocked President Obama’s candidate for regulation czar, Harvard law professor Cass Sunstein, because Sunstein has argued that animals should have the right to sue humans in court.

Obama has picked Sunstein, his adviser and longtime friend, to head the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, an office that has power to review and assess all draft regulations proposed within the administration.

But Chambliss worries that Sunstein’s innovative legal views may someday lead to a farmer having to defend himself in court against a lawsuit filed on behalf of his chickens or pigs.

Chambliss told The Hill that he has blocked Sunstein’s nomination because the law professor “has said that animals ought to have the right to sue folks.”

Indeed, in his 2004 book, Animal Rights: Current Debates and New Directions, Sunstein wrote: “I will suggest that animals should be permitted to bring suit, with human beings as their representatives, to prevent violations of current law.”

More specifically, he wrote: “Laws designed to protect animals against cruelty and abuse should be amended or interpreted to give a private cause of action against those who violate them, so as to allow private people to supplement the efforts of public prosecutors.”

Chambliss said he is also concerned about Sunstein’s potential impact on “a number of other issues relative to agriculture.”

A White House spokesman did not respond to a request for comment.

Sunstein’s nomination cleared the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee with ease in May. Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) cast the only vote against him.

But various farming and ranching interests, including the American Farm Bureau Federation, have raised concerns about Sunstein. Several have contacted Republican farm-state senators to raise concern over Sunstein’s academic writings.

In a 2002 paper, "The Rights of Animals: A Very Short Primer," Sunstein wrote: “On reflection, the spotlight should be placed squarely on the issue of suffering and well-being.”

He went on to state that this position “strongly suggests” that “there should be extensive regulation of the use of animals in entertainment, in scientific experiments, and in agriculture.”

Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.), a member of the Agriculture Committee, met with Sunstein earlier this month and said that Sunstein had provided assurance that he would not promote onerous regulations for farmers.

Chambliss said he would not lift his hold until he had a chance to ask Sunstein to explain his views in a meeting after the July 4 recess.

"I'm going to talk to him," Chambliss said. "He has not had the opportunity to look me in the eye."

An aide to Chambliss said the senator is also concerned by Sunstein’s suggestion during a 2007 speech that hunting should be banned.

As head of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, a branch of the Office of Management and Budget, Sunstein would have sweeping authority over new Obama administration regulations.

Sunstein served as an adviser to Obama’s presidential campaign. He and Obama became friends while both teaching at the University of Chicago Law School.

Sunstein was considered a possible candidate to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice David Souter.

In addition to farming interests, conservative groups have targeted Sunstein because of his writings. The American Conservative Union has created a website devoted to opposing his nomination.

Sunstein was considered a possible candidate to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice David Souter.

WOW! Supreme Court member who would rule on Turkeys suing US Guwmint for the cruelty of the Thanksgiving! That's the Change we can believe in!

The Silent Scream of the Asparagus
Get ready for 'plant rights.'
by Wesley J. Smith
05/12/2008, Volume 013, Issue 33


You just knew it was coming: At the request of the Swiss government, an ethics panel has weighed in on the "dignity" of plants and opined that the arbitrary killing of flora is morally wrong. This is no hoax. The concept of what could be called "plant rights" is being seriously debated.

A few years ago the Swiss added to their national constitution a provision requiring "account to be taken of the dignity of creation when handling animals, plants and other organisms." No one knew exactly what it meant, so they asked the Swiss Federal Ethics Committee on Non-Human Biotechnology to figure it out. The resulting report, "The Dignity of Living Beings with Regard to Plants," is enough to short circuit the brain.

A "clear majority" of the panel adopted what it called a "biocentric" moral view, meaning that "living organisms should be considered morally for their own sake because they are alive." Thus, the panel determined that we cannot claim "absolute ownership" over plants and, moreover, that "individual plants have an inherent worth." This means that "we may not use them just as we please, even if the plant community is not in danger, or if our actions do not endanger the species, or if we are not acting arbitrarily."

The committee offered this illustration: A farmer mows his field (apparently an acceptable action, perhaps because the hay is intended to feed the farmer's herd--the report doesn't say). But then, while walking home, he casually "decapitates" some wildflowers with his scythe. The panel decries this act as immoral, though its members can't agree why. The report states, opaquely:

At this point it remains unclear whether this action is condemned because it expresses a particular moral stance of the farmer toward other organisms or because something bad is being done to the flowers themselves.

What is clear, however, is that Switzerland's enshrining of "plant dignity" is a symptom of a cultural disease that has infected Western civilization, causing us to lose the ability to think critically and distinguish serious from frivolous ethical concerns. It also reflects the triumph of a radical anthropomorphism that views elements of the natural world as morally equivalent to people.

Why is this happening? Our accelerating rejection of the Judeo-Christian world view, which upholds the unique dignity and moral worth of human beings, is driving us crazy. Once we knocked our species off its pedestal, it was only logical that we would come to see fauna and flora as entitled to rights.

The intellectual elites were the first to accept the notion of "species-ism," which condemns as invidious discrimination treating people differently from animals simply because they are human beings. Then ethical criteria were needed for assigning moral worth to individuals, be they human, animal, or now vegetable.

Rising to the task, leading bioethicists argue that for a human, value comes from possessing sufficient cognitive abilities to be deemed a "person." This excludes the unborn, the newborn, and those with significant cognitive impairments, who, personhood theorists believe, do not possess the right to life or bodily integrity. This thinking has led to the advocacy in prestigious medical and bioethical journals of using profoundly brain impaired patients in medical experimentation or as sources of organs.

The animal rights movement grew out of the same poisonous soil. Animal rights ideology holds that moral worth comes with sentience or the ability to suffer. Thus, since both animals and humans feel pain, animal rights advocates believe that what is done to an animal should be judged morally as if it were done to a human being. Some ideologues even compare the Nazi death camps to normal practices of animal husbandry. For example, Charles Patterson wrote in Eternal Treblinka--a book specifically endorsed by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals--that "the road to Auschwitz begins at the slaughterhouse."

Eschewing humans as the pinnacle of "creation" (to borrow the term used in the Swiss constitution) has caused environmentalism to mutate from conservationism--a concern to properly steward resources and protect pristine environs and endangered species--into a willingness to thwart human flourishing to "save the planet." Indeed, the most radical "deep ecologists" have grown so virulently misanthropic that Paul Watson, the head of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society, called humans "the AIDS of the earth," requiring "radical invasive therapy" in order to reduce the population of the earth to under a billion.

As for "plant rights," if the Swiss model spreads, it may hobble biotechnology and experimentation to improve crop yields. As an editorial in Nature News put it:

The [Swiss] committee has .  .  . come up with few concrete examples of what type of experiment might be considered an unacceptable insult to plant dignity. The committee does not consider that genetic engineering of plants automatically falls into this category, but its majority view holds that it would if the genetic modification caused plants to "lose their independence"--for example by interfering with their capacity to reproduce.

One Swiss scientist quoted in the editorial worried that "plant dignity" provides "another tool for opponents to argue against any form of plant biotechnology" despite the hope it offers to improve crop yields and plant nutrition.

What folly. We live in a time of cornucopian abundance and plenty, yet countless human beings are malnourished, even starving. In the face of this cruel paradox, worry about the purported rights of plants is the true immorality.

Wesley J. Smith is a senior fellow at the Discovery Institute, an attorney for the International Task Force on Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide, and a special consultant to the Center for Bioethics and Culture.

I personally applaud these forward thinking individuals and will support them wholeheartedly, as they take the moral and ethical high ground by killing themselves so as to prevent any more eggplant murder.

when the consumption of meat and vegetables in banned in the name of species rights, I will start eating environmentalists...


just sayin

This is of course complete and dangerous nonsense that should be nipped in the bud.

We've also recently had threads whining about the use of horses for meat and about dog fighting in the UK. Animal rights activists have already made the latter sport illegal and would like to arbitrarily prohibit some animals from being eaten - purely for sentimental reasons.

Animals are not humans and shouldn't have any rights that are pursuable in courts. For example, if somebody kills and eats a pet dog, that's no worse than just stealing food and should be punished accordingly.

Since lawyers are animals .. they can speak for themselves.

The [Swiss] committee has .  .  . come up with few concrete examples of what type of experiment might be considered an unacceptable insult to plant dignity. The committee does not consider that genetic engineering of plants automatically falls into this category, but its majority view holds that it would if the genetic modification caused plants to "lose their independence"--for example by interfering with their capacity to reproduce.

So, they are against mixed marriages in humans also?

We've also recently had threads whining about the use of horses for meat and about dog fighting in the UK

that's a perfect example of why degenerates as WullCunt should be demoted from humans to animals and stripped of all rights. The nonsense this ilk of inbred degenerates produces with their shit laden pie holes is insane.

What's degenerate about dog fights or eating horse meat? Next thing we know you'll be wanting to ban hunting /angling or breeding livestock for food. Pussy do-gooder.

My pug wants to sue me because I never bought him tailor-made clothes (except a red jersey my mother-in-law knitted him). He's got a good lawyer… I think I'm fucked!

Pussy do-gooder.

lol

Kill it and grill it.

If Richard Gere tries to put me in that dark place again ... I'm not going to bother suing!

Unfortunately those animals have already the right to sue the police...

I cant believe this wasn't taken yet....

Sheep from all over France are lining up to sue Sax Sux..

"its not that funny when its right in front of you..."

So, they are against mixed marriages in humans also?

We will take that with a grain of salt coming from a Klingon/Human half breed.

'animals should have the right to sue humans in court'

I understand the gerbil community has a class action lawsuit against SsuxDicks,...

“Have you or a loved one been injured in a felching accident by ssuxdicks? You may be eligible for a cash settlement. Goldman and Goldman can help”

Let me guess, who pray tell is going to hold the proceeds of the court judgment, in trust for the animal of course.

I have a court order against mosquitos coming withn 50 yards of me. So far, so good.

When a turkey can walk into a court room, with a brief under his wing and argue his case in his own voice... I'll agree with these nut cases and not before!

animals should have the right to sue humans in court

Who gets the money? The chickens? The lawyers? PETA? I can hear the commercials now? If you don't win I don't win !!!!!!!

WhosJohnGalt wrote:

But Chambliss worries that Sunstein’s innovative legal views may someday lead to a farmer having to defend himself in court against a lawsuit filed on behalf of his chickens or pigs.

Next time, after gay marriage will be allowed, it will be people suing for the right to marry their animals. You will see.

Wulfrun wrote:


We've also recently had threads whining about the use of horses for meat and about dog fighting in the UK. Animal rights activists have already made the latter sport illegal and would like to arbitrarily prohibit some animals from being eaten - purely for sentimental reasons.

Well that depends... it is known that wild American Mustangs who are protected by law here in America (and in Canada) end at the table of many European households, that shouldn´t be allowed.

www.hcn.org . . .

I dunno if for sentimental reasons or cultural ones, but I cannot understand/ stand for people eating horses.

shit...I am done

feathers wrote:

Well that depends... it is known that wild American Mustangs who are protected by law here in America (and in Canada) end at the table of many European households, that shouldn´t be allowed.

That's the US authorities' job.

www.hcn.org . . .

From the article it looks like protecting mustangs has unintended consequences. What happens if they get so numerous and so much of a nuisance that they need to be culled?

I dunno if for sentimental reasons or cultural ones, but I cannot understand/ stand for people eating horses.

It's definitely cultural/sentimental: Muslims and Jews squirm at the idea of eating pork, Hindus at the thought of eating beef.

Horse tastes quite nice, it's very dark meat. Hard to get in Germany, but common in Dutch, Belgian, French, Swiss and Italian supermarkets.

en.wikipedia.org . . .

Alright, but we also reserve the right to sue animals for over acting. I'm talking about you, Heston!