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Elephant Personhood — Nixed Again

Photo credit: Joe Mabel, CC BY-SA 3.0 , via Wikimedia Commons.

Animal rights activists are determined to persuade a court to declare an animal a “person” to enable them to engage in unremitting lawfare against all animal uses — an advocacy project known as “animal standing.” Having failed twice in New York to have chimps and then an elephant named Happy declared persons, the Nonhuman Rights Project moved its effort to Colorado seeking writs of habeas corpus to be issued on behalf of zoo elephants.

The activists had some reason for hope. Two judges in New York’s highest court swallowed the baloney in a 5–2 ruling against elephant personhood. Thankfully, the Colorado supreme court exhibited greater wisdom in unanimously turning the case away.

Why? Because as any ten-year-old could tell the plaintiffs, elephants may be magnificent animals, but they are not persons. From Nonhuman Rights Project, Inc. v. Cheyenne Mountain Zoological Society:

Colorado’s habeas corpus statute does not define the term “person.” It is, however, defined by section 2-4-401, C.R.S. (2024), which contains definitions that “apply to every statute, unless the context otherwise requires.” Under section 2-4-401(8), “‘Person’ means any individual, corporation, government or governmental subdivision or agency, business trust, estate, trust, limited liability company, partnership, association, or other legal entity.” [Citations omitted.]

But, but, but . . . personhood could apply to higher mammals! Nope:

Looking to the dictionary, the term “person” is defined as an individual human being. . . . Given the statutory definition of the term “person” and the plain and ordinary meaning of the term found in the dictionary, we conclude that the General Assembly’s choice of the word “person” demonstrates its intent to limit the reach of section 13-45-102 to human beings.

Exactly. Rights should only apply to humans and our association and juridical entities.

The court further ruled that such a radical and culture-destroying change in law should not be imposed by courts:

Our conclusion is further bolstered by the fact that including nonhuman animals in the definition of the term “person” is the type of monumental change in the law that one would reasonably expect the General Assembly to make explicit. That is, “[i]f [the General Assembly] intended to take the extraordinary step of authorizing animals as well as people . . . to sue, they could, and should, have said so plainly.” By stating that the statute applies to “any person,” the legislature made clear to whom the statute applies. It does not include nonhuman animals.

And here’s a point I have long noted: The elephants would not actually be freed if the Nonhuman Rights Project prevailed:

Finally, we observe that NRP is not actually seeking the right to liberty — that is, freedom from captivity — for the elephants. It conceded as much during oral argument, acknowledging that it was not suggesting that the Zoo should open its gates and set the elephants loose to roam free in Colorado Springs and beyond, any more than it was suggesting that very smart dogs could not be “kept” as house pets. Instead, it asked to transfer the elephants from the Zoo to a different confinement. The fact that NRP merely seeks the transfer of the elephants from one form of confinement to another is yet another reason that habeas relief is not appropriate here.

Indeed.

Two Quick Thoughts

First, I find it interesting — and alarming — that “nature rights” activists have succeeded in having geological features essentially declared persons, even as animal rights activists (thankfully) continue to fail at a similar effort. So, laws still need to be passed at the federal and state levels limiting “rights” and court standing to human beings and our associations.

Second, our courts are too crowded and judicial resources too strained to allow radical activism masking as a legitimate legal claim to continue. It is way past time for the courts to dismiss these animal standing cases out of hand at the trial court level and impose financial sanctions against the animal rights plaintiffs for filing frivolous lawsuits. Until these cases are scorned rather than respected, animal rights activists’ attempts to find a radical judge wanting to make anti-human history will continue.

In any event, good for the Colorado supreme court — not exactly a bastion of conservatism — for seeing through the irrationality and coming to the right conclusion.

Cross-posted at National Review.

Wesley J. Smith

Chair and Senior Fellow, Center on Human Exceptionalism
Wesley J. Smith is Chair and Senior Fellow at the Discovery Institute’s Center on Human Exceptionalism. Wesley is a contributor to National Review and is the author of 14 books, in recent years focusing on human dignity, liberty, and equality. Wesley has been recognized as one of America’s premier public intellectuals on bioethics by National Journal and has been honored by the Human Life Foundation as a “Great Defender of Life” for his work against suicide and euthanasia. Wesley’s most recent book is Culture of Death: The Age of “Do Harm” Medicine, a warning about the dangers to patients of the modern bioethics movement.

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animal rightsanimal standingColoradoelephantshuman beinglawsuitsnature rightsNonhuman Rights Projectpersons