Animal Rights Organizations have been battling the use of animals in our cultures through the court systems. “In 2013 the Nonhuman Rights Project (NhRP) filed petitions in 3 trial courts in the state of New York demanding that common law writs of habeas corpus be issued on behalf of four captive chimpanzees.” (Wise par. ) The petitions asked that the courts recognize that chimpanzees are legal persons who possess the fundamental legal right to bodily liberty. All three petitions were denied, they moved the cases to the New York state appellate courts. Two of the petitions were rejected on differing grounds. The third petition was thrown out for lack of the right to appeal.
According to Jonathan Reuters, in 2012 the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA) filed a false lawsuit on the Ringling and Bros. Circus. ASPCA and others originally filed suit in 2000 against Feld Entertainment, producer of the circus, accusing the Virginia-based company of mistreating the Asian elephants that perform in its shows. Tom Rider (elephant trainer) claimed that he was “emotionally injured by the company’s treatment of its elephants.” The judge declared Tom Rider a “paid
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Today ASPCA is one of the largest humane societies in the world. It was founded on the belief that animals are entitled to kind and respectful treatment at the hands of humans and must be protected under the law. In 1993 the ASPCA took 60,000 animals into its two shelters and killed nearly 35,000 of them. In 2013, the ASPCA gave $4.9 million to support animal shelters, a mere 4% of its $129 million budget. Despite having received $115 million in contributions in 2013, ASPCA only found homes for 3,400 dogs and cats, according to its annual