ANIMALS’ RIGHTS CONSIDERED IN RELATION TO SOCIAL PROGRESS BY HENRY S. SALT REVISED EDITION LONDON G. BELL AND SONS, LTD. York House, Portugal Street 1922 TO MY FRIEND HOWARD WILLIAMS AND OTHER HUMANITARIAN COLLEAGUES...

As a memorial of work done on behalf of the rights of animals, it has been thought fitting, by members and friends of the late Humanitarian League, that a new edition of this little book should be published in the year that brings the centenary of “Martin’s Act,” the first legislation for the prevention of cruelty to the non-human races. Of the progress made in this branch of ethics, since 1822, some account is incidentally given in the book; and during the last few years the advance has been st

Have the lower animals “rights”? Undoubtedly—if men have. That is the point I wish to make evident in this opening chapter. But have men rights? Let it be stated at the outset that I have no intention of discussing the abstract theory of rights, which at the present time is looked upon with suspicion and disfavour by many social reformers, since it has not unfrequently been made to cover the most extravagant and contradictory assertions. But though its phraseology is vague, there is nevertheless

The main principle of animals’ rights, if admitted to be fundamentally sound, will not be essentially affected by the wildness or the domesticity, as the case may be, of the animals in question; both classes have their rights, though these rights may differ largely in extent and importance. It is convenient, however, to consider the subject of the domestic animals apart from that of the wild ones, inasmuch as their whole relation to mankind is so much altered and emphasized by the fact of their

That wild animals, no less than domestic animals, have their rights, albeit of a less positive character and far less easy to define, is an essential point which follows directly from the acceptance of the general principle of a jus animalium . It is of the utmost importance to emphasize the fact that, whatever the legal fiction may have been, or may still be, the rights of animals are not morally dependent on the so-called rights of property. The domination of property has left its trail indeli

It is impossible that any discussion of the principle of animals’ rights can be at all adequate or conclusive which ignores, as many so-called humanitarians still ignore, the immense underlying importance of the food question. The origin of the habit of flesh-eating need not greatly concern us; let us assume, in accordance with the most favoured theory, that animals were first slaughtered by the uncivilized migratory tribes under the stress of want, and that the practice thus engendered, being f

That particular form of recreation which is euphemistically known as “sport” has a close historical connection with the practice of flesh-eating, inasmuch as the hunter was in old times what the butcher is now,—the “purveyor” on whom the family was dependent for its daily supply of victuals. Modern sport, however, as usually carried on in civilized European countries, has degenerated into what has been well described as “amateur butchery,” a system under which the slaughter of certain kinds of a

We have seen what a vast amount of quite preventable suffering is caused through the agency of the slaughterman who kills for a business, and of the sportsman who kills for a pastime, the victims in either case being regarded as mere irrational automata, with no higher destiny than to satisfy the most artificial wants or the most cruel caprices of mankind. A few words must now be said about the fur and feather traffic—the slaughter of mammals and birds for human clothing or human ornamentation—a

Great is the change when we turn from the easy, thoughtless indifferentism of the sportsman or the milliner to the more determined and deliberately chosen attitude of the scientist—so great, indeed, that by many people, even among professed champions of animals’ rights, it is held impossible to trace such dissimilar lines of action to one and the same source. Yet it can be shown, I think, that in this instance, as in those already examined, the prime cause of man’s injustice to the lower animals

Having now applied the principle with which we started to the several cases where it appears to be most flagrantly overlooked, we are in a better position to estimate the difficulties and the possibilities of its future acceptance. Our investigation of animals’ rights has necessarily been, in large measure, an enumeration of animals’ wrongs, a story of cruelty and injustice which might have been unfolded in far greater and more impressive detail, had there been any reason for here repeating what

THE TERM “RIGHTS” [50] It was argued by Mr. D. G. Ritchie, in his book on “Natural Rights,” that though “we may be said to have duties of kindness towards the animals,” it is “incorrect to represent these as strictly duties towards the animals themselves, as if they had rights against us.” (The italics are Mr. Ritchie’s.) I take this to mean that, in man’s “duty of kindness,” it is the “kindness” only that has reference to animals, the “duty” being altogether the private affair of the man. The k

THE NEO-CARTESIANS [51] Attempts are still made, from time to time, to revive the old Cartesian doctrine that animals do not feel pain. Thus Mr. E. Kay Robinson, in a book entitled “The Religion of Nature” (1906) has sought to bring peace and comfort to the minds of his readers, and to reconcile the seeming cruelties of Nature with the existence of a merciful God, by proving that the non-human races, unlike mankind, have no consciousness of suffering, even when they exhibit all the symptoms of p

MOTOR VERSUS HORSE [52] “After many centuries of usefulness,” so it is said, “the horse is about to be retired from active service as an agent in locomotion.” Electricity, petrol, and cable tramcars are to be the chief factors in this change, which will replace horsepower by the greater energies of mechanical invention, and will make it possible to ride a hundred miles “for about a shilling.” Looking at the matter as humanitarians we are heartily pleased at the prospect. To be sure, it is not ve

ZOOLOGICAL GARDENS. [53] Some fifty or sixty years ago the poet, James Thomson (“B.V.”), wrote as follows in his journal:— “It being a very wet Sunday, I had to keep in, and paced much, prisoner-like, to and fro my room. This reminded me of the wild beasts at Regent’s Park, and especially of the great wild birds, the vultures and eagles. How they must suffer! How long will it be ere the thought of such agonies becomes intolerable to the public conscience, and wild creatures be left at liberty wh

SCIENTIST AND SACERDOTALIST [54] What do our up-to-date scientists think (if they think at all) of the justification of vivisection put forward by Monsignor John S. Vaughan, a sacerdotalist of the medieval school? To a watchful observer few things could have been more entertaining than the spectacle of an old-world Catholic, a belated casuist of (say) thirteenth century temperament, coming forward in the Saturday Review (new style) to justify, from a moral standpoint, the doings of the modern vi

THE CONFESSIONS OF A PHYSICIAN [55] “Confessions of a Physician,” by V. Veresaeff, is a Russian work, first published in 1901, the writer of which exposes with the utmost frankness the secrets of the medical profession—the doubts, difficulties, dangers, scruples, failures, and even homicides, that fall to the lot of the practitioner. It is not that Veresaeff is disloyal to his colleagues; but his judgment is drawn in two opposite directions by his sense of duty to Science on the one side, and to

ANTIPATHY OR SYMPATHY? [57] It is to be regretted that so distinguished a writer as Mr. G. K. Chesterton should have given countenance to the idea that an assertion of the rights of animals implies a denial of the rights of man. “I use the word humanitarian,” he says (in his book “Orthodoxy,”) “in the ordinary sense, as meaning one who upholds the claims of all creatures against those of humanity.” This strange blunder of supposing that we humanitarians regard the interests of humans and sub-hum

THE ANIMAL QUESTION AND THE SOCIAL QUESTION [59] It is, perhaps, not sufficiently recognized by zoophilists how largely the ill-usage of the lower animals is due to the iniquity of present social conditions, and how vain it is to expect to remedy the consequences without attacking the cause. So long as pecuniary profit and self-interest are accepted as the guiding principles of trade, it will remain impossible to secure a right treatment for animals; because it is absurd to suppose that mankind

“Free Thoughts upon the Brute Creation.” By John Hildrop, M.A. London, 1742. This examination of Father Bougeant’s “Philosophical Amusement upon the Language of Beasts” (1740) is an argument in favour of animal immortality. “A Reasonable Plea for the Animal Creation.” By Robert Morris. London, 1746. A reprint of some letters urging that “we have no right to destroy, much less to eat of any thing which has life.” “An Essay on the Future Life of Brutes.” By Richard Dean. Manchester, 1767. The prob