California passes sweeping new 'animal abuse' laws that give government massive new powers over animal ownership

Saturday, February 02, 2013 by: Ethan A. Huff, staff writer
Tags: California, animal abuse, pets

(NaturalNews) If you live in California and own pets or livestock, you could soon be criminalized as an animal abuser for things like letting your livestock roam on pasture or transferring ownership of rare-breed animals in a parking lot. Two new laws recently passed under the auspices of animal protection actually threaten to eliminate animal ownership throughout the state, as they re-categorize normal animal rearing methods as acts of abuse worthy of criminal fines and unwarranted seizure of said animals.

The bills are AB 1117 and SB 917, and they were passed under a shroud of secrecy. Those who knew about the bills were told they would protect animals from abuse. But upon closer investigation, AB 1117 and SB 917 were clearly designed to incriminate animal ownership and discourage livestock farming. SB 917, as it turns out, makes it a crime to both sell and give away animals on any street, highway, public right-of-way, parking lot, carnival or boardwalk, while AB 1117 gives full authority to humane and peace officers to seize and destroy animals without a warrant.

Together, the two bills essentially give control to the state government to steal animals from people accused of animal abuse, even if no evidence exists to prove that animal abuse actually took place. Worse, the tenets of the two laws are so loosely defined, with no clear intent as to what constitutes "abuse" by definition, that virtually anyone who becomes a target of the state could lose their pets or livestock with a simple accusation of abuse.

"The California law, burying the wording between words about beating and torture, defines normal activities with animals as abuse," explains Food Freedom News. "And it refers to no standard of what is normal in raising animals, and requires no proof that any animal has been harmed. [Lawmakers have] figured out a way to turn raising animals outside on grass -- the ideal life for those animals and their then producing the healthiest food -- into a felony. And they've done it under the aegis of protecting animals."

Many US states now pushing laws to criminalize animal ownership

Such lunacy is not reserved to California, sadly, as numerous other U.S. states are pushing their own laws that would essentially criminalize animal ownership. As we reported back in 2012, the state of Michigan passed a not-so-cleverly disguised "Invasive Species Order" (ISO) that reclassified most rare-breed pig breeds as "feral," and thus illegal. Beginning last April, the state actually went around with SWAT teams raiding local farms and shooting these rare-breed species (https://www.naturalnews.com/035372_Michigan_pigs_farm_freedom.html).

And back in 2011, Illinois lawmakers tried to push House Bill 1166, which would have required pet owners to actually get a state-issued permit if they wished to possess more than six animals as pets. Included in this pet category, as explained in a Pet Industry Joint Advisory Council (PIJAC) report, were the usual cats and dogs, as well as fish. Thousands of Illinois residents with even one fish tank of fish, in other words, would have become criminals overnight (http://www.pijac.org).

Such madness is continually predicated on "protecting the animals," which is similar to the current gun control madness that is draped in "protecting the children." In both cases, bureaucrats are attempting to bypass individuals' human and constitutional rights by injecting an emotional charge into their plea. And unless Americans start vehemently opposing such abuse as it creeps to the surface, it will only continue to intensify until all our freedoms are lost.

Sources for this article include:

http://foodfreedomgroup.com