The United States Supreme Court on January 7 declined to hear cases challenging anti-animal confinement laws in California and Massachusetts.
In both cases, states filing the suits to overturn the California and Massachusetts laws challenged the constitutionality of the laws, stating that one state cannot mandate how agricultural production is done in other states.
Challenge to California laws
One of the cases rejected was a challenge to animal confinement laws in California that, among other things, call for specific criteria for housing conditions for egg-laying hens. California’s Proposition 2 requires that all eggs produced in California come from hens that have adequate room to stand up, sit down, turn around and extend their limbs without touching another bird or the sides of the cage. AB 1437 requires that eggs from all other states that are sold in California be raised according to Proposition 2 standards.
The court’s rejection of the case would also clear the way for the recently passed Proposition 12, which calls for even stricter standards, requiring that all eggs produced in or sold in California to come from cage-free laying systems by the end of 2021.
The legal challenge to the California laws was filed by the Missouri Attorney General’s Office, and the states of Alabama, Arkansas, Indiana, Iowa, Louisiana, Nebraska, Nevada, and North Dakota joined in the suit.
Challenge to Massachusetts law
In 2016, Massachusetts voters passed a similar statewide ballot initiative, known as Question 3, which when it becomes law in 2022, would make it illegal for farmers to keep sows in gestation crates, layer hens in cages, or calves in veal crates. The law will also make it illegal for products raised in other states and not in accordance with those standards to be sold in Massachusetts.
Indiana filed the legal challenge to the Massachusetts standards, and Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Texas, Utah, West Virginia and Wisconsin joined Indiana in the suit.
The rejection of both legal challenges was praised by the Humane Society of the United States (HSUS).
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