Free Republic

An unpalatable and indefensible initiative that cannot end well. Republican lawmakers in the U.S. House of Representatives recently took the politically questionable – and morally objectionable – step of voting to allow horses to once again be slaughtered on American soil for human consumption. It’s a massive power grab by the beef lobby, which would prefer to cull wild horses and burros so public lands can be devoted to livestock-grazing. No one else will rejoice in the heartland at the prospect of being able to chow down on a horse steak or a horse-burger. Most Americans are opposed to hippophagy,...

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. – A federal appeals court on Friday removed a temporary ban on domestic horse slaughter, clearing the way for companies in New Mexico, Missouri and Iowa to open while an appeal of a lawsuit by animal protection groups proceeds. The 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver lifted the emergency injunction it issued in November after The Humane Society of the United States and others appealed the ruling of a federal judge in Albuquerque. The judge said the U.S. Department of Agriculture followed proper procedure in issuing permits to Valley Meat Co. in Roswell, N.M., Rains Natural...

While we were celebrating Thanksgiving, Obama quietly signed legislation on November 18, which removed the ban on horse slaughter and allowing it for human consumption. Why did he change his position on banning the horse slaughter? As we know, President Obama made a campaign promise in 2008 to permanently ban horse slaughter and exports of horses for human consumption. Furthermore, in certain States, the U.S. Federal Government set aside millions of acres of public lands for the indigenous wild horses, or Mustangs. Read more... http://www.naturalremediesmatter.wordpress.com

Since all three U.S. horse slaughter operations were ordered closed last year, the number of horses exported to Mexico for slaughter has exploded. As of Dec. 20, 2007, 44,475 horses had been shipped to Mexico for processing for human consumption compared with 10,783 shipped at the same time in 2006—a 312 percent increase. Especially troubling is the treatment of the horses once they cross the border into Mexico. In October, the Humane Society of the United States released a video showing the brutal stabbing death of a fully conscious horse at a Mexican slaughter facility. "It is time for this...

It is one of the biggest issues the American Horse Council is dealing with and Dave Howell, chairman of the American Horse Council’s State Horse Council Advisory Committee tells Brownfield it is really big. “So today we are facing over 212,000, documented starving horses in the United States,” said Howell. Brought about by the horse slaughter ban, the issue is one that no one seems to have an answer for - not even the American Horse Council. “We have cases where they have been turned loose in parks, they’ve been turned loose in coal mine areas, they’ve been turned loose...

A surge in exports of unwanted horses across the border for slaughter has horrified animal-welfare advocates, who say they will redouble efforts for a law to ban shipments of horses to Mexican and Canadian slaughterhouses. Court rulings this year closed the only three American horse-slaughter plants, including facilities in Fort Worth and Kaufman. Since January, so-called killer buyers who purchase unwanted horses at auctions have shipped 48,000 horses to Canada and Mexico for slaughter. U.S. exports to Mexican slaughterhouses are up by 369 percent, the San Antonio Express-News reported. On Sunday, the Express-News chronicled the crude method used to kill...

MURCHISON -- There are scores of fowl, from Muscovy ducks to ostriches and emu, exotic critters such as a zebra and a puma, 22 iguana, an alligator, a water buffalo, a kangaroo, a baboon and about two dozen other primates, 20 prairie dogs, 42 cattle, 17 bison, 144 feral pigs, a pair of Vietnamese potbellied pigs, and two wolf hybrids among the 1,277 creatures great and small on Black Beauty Ranch. The total includes 223 horses, some abused, others handed over by owners who were unable to care for them. Riding horses is forbidden at the bucolic 1,300-acre refuge in...

HOUSTON - A federal appeals court has ruled that horse slaughter is illegal in Texas, home to two of the nation's three processing plants.The decision, issued late Friday by the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans, overturns a lower federal district court's ruling last year on a 1949 Texas law that banned horse slaughter for the purpose of selling the meat for food.The lower court had said the Texas law was invalid because it had already been repealed by another statute and pre-empted by federal law.But in the 5th Circuit's decision, Judge Fortunato Benavides wrote that "The...