Horse slaughter amendment passed in U.S. Senate

The Wednesday September 21 Wall Street Journal has a front page story headed, "Why Belgians Shoot Horses in Texas For Dining in Europe" while the Thoroughbred Times announces "Slaughter amendment passes U.S. Senate."

The Thoroughbred Times piece explains, "The United States Senate on Tuesday joined the U.S. House of Representatives by overwhelmingly passing an amendment to the U.S. Department of Agriculture Appropriations Bill that will remove federal funding for mandated meat inspectors at the three remaining, foreign-owned horse slaughterhouses in the United States. If signed into law by President George Bush, it effectively would shut them down when the 2006 fiscal year begins October 1....The bill to end horse slaughter permanently in the United States, the American Horse Slaughter Prevention Act (H.R. 503), was re-introduced into the House of Representatives last February and is before the House Energy and Commerce Committee."

For more information on that bill, and you can help, go to https://community.hsus.org/campaign/2005_horse_slaughter

The Wall Street Journal front page story points out that the three horse slaughter plants in the US are foreign owned and sell their meat overseas. It says, "Federal law doesn't ban eating horse in the U.S., but the meat is now no longer sold for human consumption domestically....The U.S. Department of Agriculture, which inspects the horses headed for foreign tables, says 58,736 horses were slaughtered in the U.S. last year for human consumption, yielding 13.6 million pounds of meat for export to the European Union, Japan, Mexico and Switzerland. A decade ago, there were around a dozen U.S. facilities slaughtering horses for export. Today, with demand declining, that's down to just two in Texas and one in Illinois."

It discusses the attempts to ban horse slaughter in the USA and tell us, "While the debate goes on, an American Airlines flight takes off every day from Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport, headed for Paris's Charles DeGaulle airport with a load of horse carcasses in its cargo belly. ...So far, economic arguments have prevailed over the emotional appeals of the antislaughter forces. Mr. Bradshaw, the slaughterhouse lobbyist, tells lawmakers the Texas plants spend $6 million a year shipping horse meat with American Airlines and other U.S. carriers."

The passage, yesterday, of the Ensign-Byrd horse slaughter amendment suggests the tide is turning.

Wall Street Journal subscribes can read the whole article on line at http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB112726478131246913,00.html

The front page story presents a great opportunity for letters to the editor in support of a permanent horse slaughter ban. Those who are horrified by the treatment of animals that America considers it acceptable to eat (see http://www.factoryfarming.com ) can use this as a jump-off point for letters on that issue.

The Wall Street Journal takes letters at: wsj.ltrs [at] wsj.com. Always include your full name, address, and daytime phone number when sending a letter to the editor. Shorter letters are more likely to be published.

I send thanks to Roy Fassel for making sure we saw the Wall Street Journal article.


(DawnWatch is an animal advocacy media watch that looks at animal issues in the media and facilitates one-click responses to the relevant media outlets. You can learn more about it, and sign up for alerts at http://www.DawnWatch.com. If you forward or reprint DawnWatch alerts, please do so unedited -- leave DawnWatch in the title and include this tag line.)