With House and Senate Agriculture committee members beginning the elaborate process of assembling the next Farm Bill, we expect another protracted fight in Congress over states’ rights and animal welfare. However, a new bill introduced this week—H.R. 2887 by Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner, R-Wisc.—is a radical federal overreach that overshadows anything we might have anticipated with a new Farm Bill debate. It could strip states of their right to protect their own citizens, and it represents the most serious threat imaginable to animal welfare protections.
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If enacted, this measure would put dozens of state animal protection laws at risk, including measures dealing with the extreme confinement of farm animals, horse slaughter and the sale of horsemeat, the sale of foie gras produced by force-feeding ducks and geese, tail docking of dairy cows and processing downer livestock, commerce in shark fins and rhino horn, and potentially even bans on the sale of dog and cat meat.
Innocuously titled by its authors the "No Regulation Without Representation Act," the bill should more accurately be called the "States’ Rights Elimination Act." Like the King amendment in previous years, it could potentially nullify state laws relating to animal cruelty, child labor, cigarette safety, and even the labeling of farm-raised fish. It’s an attempt to strip states of their right to ensure the health and welfare of their citizens, prohibiting them from regulating the sale of any product produced in another state—no matter how dangerous, unethical, or environmentally destructive.
The National Conference of State Legislatures, the bipartisan organization representing Republican and Democratic lawmakers in the states, calls this "one of the most coercive, intrusive, and preemptive legislature measures ever introduced in Congress." NCSL notes that:
The Framers of the Constitution would be alarmed, as they intended the role of the federal government to be limited, not a government that could regulate anything it wanted. The No Regulation Without Representation Act embodies the usurpation of state sovereignty and expansion of federal overreach the Framers feared. The legislation violates the Tenth Amendment’s guarantee that the sovereign rights of states cannot be abridged by Congress and aims to eliminate states’ powers within their borders, destroying the fundamental principles of federalism that have guided our nation since its founding.
Why should states be forced to allow commerce in products they have banned, for reasons of animal cruelty, food safety, and other compelling purposes? State lawmakers, governors, and regulators took action on these matters through established political processes granted to the states, and why should a small number of lawmakers in Washington trump the views of duly elected state officials?
There are so many policy issues traditionally handled by the states, in the realm of agriculture alone. What about state laws regulating the sale of raw milk, the labeling of catfish, fire-safety standards for cigarettes, the sale of dangerous pesticides, the importation of invasive pests (such as with firewood), or state quality standards for butter?
But the new legislation is much more sweeping than just agricultural products, and covers all activities involving interstate commerce. There’s no telling how broadly this could be applied to state and local laws across a wide range of businesses. Could it prevent states from regulating strip clubs, or require dry counties to open liquor stores? Could it force states to allow abortion services if the doctors come in from another state? Would state laws on marriage licenses, pornography, drugs, guns, prostitution, and bestiality be up for grabs?
It’s ironic that some politicians often say they are for states’ rights when they agree with what the states are doing, but when they don’t like the result, they are perfectly fine with federal mandates telling states what they can and cannot do. The proponents of this legislation are trying to hang on to outdated factory farming practices, but the world has changed. The idea of extreme confinement is on its way out, with more than 200 food retail companies pledging to cleanse their supply chains of products that come from these sorts of inhumane confinement systems.
A broad and diverse coalition helped to stave off this destructive provision last time the Farm Bill was considered, and we must rally together again. Republicans and Democrats from every region of the country and every part of the political spectrum all have an interest in defeating this sweeping and unconstitutional attack on states’ rights. Not only is the protection of millions of animals in jeopardy, but this radical attack also threatens years of lawmaking by citizens and elected officials, and the very principles on which our country was founded.
