{"id":256709,"date":"2021-11-06T11:41:22","date_gmt":"2021-11-06T16:41:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.liveaction.org\/news\/?p=256709"},"modified":"2021-11-05T01:13:14","modified_gmt":"2021-11-05T06:13:14","slug":"us-judge-hippos-persons-preborn-humans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/us-judge-hippos-persons-preborn-humans\/","title":{"rendered":"US judge recognizes hippos as persons, while preborn humans still have no rights"},"content":{"rendered":"
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U.S. courts have recognized a commune of hippos formerly owned by a late Colombian cocaine kingpin as juridic persons \u2014 a first for animals \u2014 while preborn human babies lag far behind these animals in terms of rights recognized by the federal judiciary.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

In the 1980s, infamous drug lord Pablo Escobar owned four hippos which he kept in a personal zoo. After his death in 1993, the hippos remained undisturbed on his property, until they bred and eventually escaped to the Magdalena River, where they have since multiplied rapidly, having no natural predators. Today, the population of nearly 120 hippos has been wreaking havoc on the local ecosystem. Their waste has been responsible for dangerous algae blooms, and they have been responsible for several attacks on local fisherman.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Several solutions have been proposed to address the problem of the hippos, including killing, sterilizing, or giving the hippos contraceptives. That\u2019s when the Animal Legal Defense Fund (ALDF) filed an application to have two hippo experts from Ohio testify on non-lethal, non-surgical options for addressing the Escobar \u201ccocaine hippo\u201d problem. They would be speaking on behalf of the hippos, who are the plaintiffs (the \u201ccommunity of hippopotamuses living in the Magdalena River\u201d) in the suit. And in late October, federal Judge Karen Litkovitz granted the request. Her reason for doing so was based on a U.S. law that allows for \u201cinterested persons\u201d in foreign litigation to request U.S. expert depositions in their foreign case. <\/span><\/p>\n

In granting the request, the hippos have been recognized as juridic persons.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

READ:\u00a0UK government expands abortion while seeking to recognize animals as sentient beings<\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

By recognizing the juridic personhood of foreign animals, Judge Litkovitz has granted what has long been denied to preborn babies in the womb in the United States. For nearly five decades in the U.S., the Supreme Court\u00a0<\/span>Roe v. Wade<\/span><\/i> decision\u00a0<\/span>has been used by federal courts to deny legal personhood to preborn babies in the name of a so-called constitutional right to abortion \u2014 a right that <\/span>does not and should not exist<\/span><\/a>, let alone trump the right of preborn human babies to live.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cAnimals have the right to be free from cruelty and exploitation, and the failure of U.S. courts to recognize their rights impedes the ability to enforce existing legislative protections,\u201d said Stephen Wells, Executive Director for the ALDF in a <\/span>statement<\/span><\/a>. \u201cThe court\u2019s order authorizing the hippos to exercise their legal right to obtain information in the United States is a critical milestone in the broader animal status fight to recognize that animals have enforceable rights.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Sadly, preborn humans are not granted the same legal status as Pablo Escobar\u2019s cocaine hippos in U.S. federal court. As Live Action News has <\/span>pointed out<\/span><\/a>, the U.S. has among of the most extreme pro-abortion legal regimes in the world. It is only one of seven countries, along with North Korea and China, to allow elective abortion past 20 weeks\u2019 gestation.<\/span><\/p>\n

As Josh Craddock, former editor of the Harvard Journal of Law and James Wilson Institute affiliated scholar, has pointed out in a Live Action Pro-Life Replies <\/span>video<\/span><\/a>, the legal regime established by <\/span>Roe v. Wade <\/span><\/i>is predicated on the denial of personhood to preborn babies. Craddock notes that Justice Harry Blackmun, who authored the majority opinion in <\/span>Roe<\/span><\/i>, recognized that \u201cif prenatal \u2018personhood\u2019 could be established, then children in the womb would be \u2018guaranteed\u2019 the right to life by the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n