Letters to the Editor
Strong opposition...Forced microchip animal implants Feb 9, 2006, 10:01
Dear Editor,
This letter is being written to state my strong opposition to the forced
microchip implants in animals that is presently being legislated and mandated
by the federal government in clear violation of the Constitutional rights of
the American people. Its purpose is also to enlighten the large number of people
who do not know what is happening before it is too late to stop it.
Beginning with the National Animal Identification System, anyone owning
cattle, horses, buffalo, cattle, goats, and pigs will be forced to buy a
permit and have his/home identified as a federal “premises.” The next step is
forced implantation of a satellite traceable microchip implanted in every
animal at the owner’s expense. Finally, as the database grows, every animal
owner will be force to report to the federal government the birth, death,
sale or trade of every animal. You will be force to report to the government
every time your animal leaves your premises for any reason, including but not
limited to animal shows including fairs and 4-H activities, trail riding,
team roping or penning events, breeding, moving to another pasture, anytime
your animal leaves your premises for any reason. You will further be forced
to report what other animals your animal was near during your outing. There
will be penalties for failure to comply that may include fines and/or jail
time. The full text and timetable of this mess can be found online at Animal ID. The initial cost of
implementation to U.S. Taxpayers and animal owners is estimated at $33
billion dollars. Even if you do not raise or own animals, do you need to pay
more taxes or higher prices for meat?
Dog and cat owners, beware of Paws (S1139-HR2669) presently in Congress. This
legislation will require implants in pet and some very strict neutering
clauses are included. Of course, it’s all under the guise of protecting our
pets. While I have no objection to those who choose to microchip their pets
doing so, forcing this is just plain wrong!
Why is this being done? Money of course. There are close to 73.9 million pet
dogs and 90.5 million cats in the USA alone, according to the APPMA - the
American Pet Products Manufacturer's Association. The potential market for
micro chipping just the dogs and cats is $5.7 billion dollars a year if you
figure 163,000,000 pets x $35 = $5,705,000,000. The cost of farm animals
would be another astronomical figure. Who is going to pay for this? I am, you
are, we all are!
Who is behind the Animal Identification Plan?
Large Agribusiness. Why? It will drive more small farmers out of business and
give them complete control over the animal food market.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture who wrote the plan. Why? The influx of
billions of tax dollars to their agency, the control of massive database of
information about everyone who owns an animal will make their power rival
that of the Defense Department.
Chip Manufacturers. The why is obvious and they have lobbying politicians to
get these mandates passed.
Small farmers and ranchers had NO input into this system, yet they will be
impacted by it the most. The cost will drive many out of business. Many more
will not choose to completely give up their right to privacy. Still others
will go out of business as their markets dry up because people not wanting to
deal with the beaurocratic nightmare stop buying animals for companions,
show, 4-H and all the myriad of other reasons we presently have for buying
and selling animals.
The human microchip is also a reality. Mercola. Implantation is presently
voluntary but how long until it becomes as voluntary as Social Security? We,
the People of these United States need to draw a line in the sand. They can
only do this to us if we choose to comply. It is time to spread the word, to
stand up and say “No!” I urge you to join me in writing letters, especially
to your governor and State Legislator and tell them you are opposed to this
and will not comply. Never doubt the power of passive resistance. Ghandi
changed the course of a nation with it, so can we!
Comments on NAIS "Draft Program Standards" and "Draft
Strategic Plan"
June 29, 2005
Introduction:
I practice law in St. Lawrence County, a leading dairy-producing region of
New York State. I am also the Executive Director of Farm for Life, a
nonprofit group supporting small-scale and sustainable farmers, and citizens
who raise livestock and crops for their own food. (We refer to this last
category as "home farmers.")
I have carefully examined the Draft Program Standards (Standards) and Draft
Strategic Plan (Plan) issued by the USDA (the Department) on April 25, 2005,
in furtherance of the Department's proposed National Animal Identification
System (NAIS). Many aspects of the Standards and Plan appear to create
insurmountable legal, fiscal, and logistical problems. The comments below
address five categories of problems:
(1) constitutional infirmities of the proposed program;
(2) an enormous economic cost to animal owners, the States, the Department,
and, ultimately, to American taxpayers and consumers for a program likely to
be ineffectual;
(3) weaknesses in the stated rationales for the program;
(4) a lack of consideration of alternative, far cheaper and more easily
administered measures which would more effectively protect animal health and
food security; and
(5) a lack of notice and an opportunity to be heard for medium-scale,
small-scale, and home farmers, and for other citizens owning livestock solely
for their own use or pleasure, in the Department's process thus far.
1. The Standards and Plan Violate Many Provisions of the Constitution.
First Amendment Violations. Many Christians (as well as persons of other
religious beliefs) cannot comply with the Department's proposed program
because it violates their First Amendment right to free exercise. For
example, the Old Order Amish believe they are prohibited from registering
their farms or animals in the proposed program due to, inter alia, Scriptural
prohibitions. The way of life of these devout Christians requires them to use
horses for transportation, support themselves by simple methods of dairy
farming (most ship milk to cheese producers, since their faith prohibits the
use of the technologies required for modern fluid milk production), and raise
animals for the family's own food. The proposed NAIS would place the Amish
and other people of faith in an untenable position of violating one or
another requirement of their most important beliefs. Further, it is not
unlikely that enactment of the NAIS as presently proposed would force the
Amish and other devout people to seek migration to another nation. It would
greatly injure the status of our country among the community of nations if
the Department's actions were to result in the forced migration of such
simple, devout, and peaceful people.
Fourth Amendment Violations. The Department proposes surveillance of every
property where even a single animal of any livestock species is kept; and to
require, at a minimum, the radio-frequency identification tagging of every
animal. (Standards, pp. 3-4, 6, 17-18.) Perhaps the Department had in mind as
its model large commercial facilities where thousands, or in many cases tens
of thousands, of animals are housed or processed. However, aside from large
livestock businesses, there are also tens of millions of individual American
citizens who own a pet horse, keep a half-dozen laying hens, or raise one
steer, pig, or lamb for their own food. In these instances, the
"premises" that the Department plans to subject to GPS satellite
surveillance (Standards, p. 10) and distance radio-frequency reading
(Standards, p. 27) are the homes of these tens of millions of citizens. The
government is not permitted to use sense-enhancing technologies to invade the
privacy of citizens' homes. Kyllo v. United States, 533 U.S. 27 (2001). The
sanctity of the home is entitled to privacy protection in circumstances where
an industrial complex is not. See Dow Chemical v. United States, 476 U.S.
227, 238 (1986). Therefore, the Department should abandon its present
proposals, insofar as they entail enormously intrusive surveillance against
unsuspecting innocent citizens who have done nothing more than to own an
animal (a common form of personal property under the American system of law).
Fifth and Fourteenth Amendment Violations. The proposed NAIS is the first
attempt by the federal government at forced registration in a huge, permanent
federal database of individual citizens' real property (the homes and farms
where animals are kept) and personal property (the animals themselves). (Standards,
pp. 8-13; Plan, pp. 8, 12-13.) Indeed, the only general systems of permanent
registration of personal property in the United States are systems
administered by the individual states for two items that are highly dangerous
if misused: motor vehicles and guns. It is difficult to imagine any
acceptable basis for the Department to subject the owner of a chicken to more
intrusive surveillance than the owner of a gun. For example, whereas the
owner of a long gun generally can take the gun and go hunting beyond the
confines of his or her own property without notifying the government, the
Department proposes that the chicken owner, under pain of unspecified
"enforcement," must report within 24 hours any instance of a
chicken leaving or returning to the registered property. (Standards, pp. 13,
18-19, 21; Plan, p. 17.)
Even more important than the trammeling of basic property rights under the
program is the insult to fundamental human rights, which must remain free
from government interference. See Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558, 565 (2003).
These fundamental human rights include decisions about nutrition and bodily
integrity. Cruzan v. Director, Missouri Dept. of Health, 497 U.S. 261 (1990);
Rochin v. California, 342 U.S. 165 (1952). Surely, it is overreaching for the
Department to propose, as it has, the constant surveillance of one's home and
animals when the citizen is only attempting to raise food for the household
or for a limited local area, and there is no intention of distributing the
food on a wider scale.
The foregoing numerous constitutional infirmities are bound to enmesh the
Department and state governments in extremely costly litigation for years to
come. Therefore, please reconsider the Department's plans to institute a
program so at odds with fundamental American values.
2. Practical and Cost Impediments to Enforcement.
As discussed more fully below (see no. 5, Lack of Notice), most owners of a
small number of livestock are not even aware of the USDA's proposals at
present (see, e.g., "Helping to Head Off A Livestock I.D. Crisis,"
Lancaster Farming, May 28, 2005, p. A38, discussing difficulties of informing
all farmers of the NAIS requirements). The Department does not plan to issue
"alerts" to inform livestock owners of the requirements until April
2007, only eight months prior to the date when it will be mandatory to submit
the GPS coordinates of one's home and the RFID of one's animal to the USDA
database. The final rule governing mandatory home and animal surveillance
will not be published until "fall 2007" (Plan, p. 10), leaving only
a couple of months, at best, for notification and compliance before January
2008. The citizens apt to own small numbers of livestock are rural dwellers
who have chosen their way of life partly as a means of escaping excessive
corporate and government bureaucracy. These factors suggest the likelihood of
a noncompliance problem of heroic proportions. In addition, the proposals
call for an animal owner to report, within 24 hours, any missing animal, any
missing tag, the sale of an animal, the death of an animal, the slaughter of
an animal, the purchase of an animal, the movement of an animal off the farm
or homestead, the movement of an animal onto the farm or homestead. (Standards,
pp. 13, 18-19, 21.) The Department plans to demand the following actions by
all animal owners according to the stated timeline: "January 2008: All
premises registered with enforcement (regardless of livestock movements). . .
. January 2008: Animal identification required with enforcement. . . . January
2009: Enforcement for the reporting of animal movements." (Plan, p. 17;
emphasis added.) Moreover, the NAIS will "prohibit any person" from
removing an I.D. device, causing the removal of an I.D. device, applying a
second I.D. device, altering an I.D. device to change its number, altering an
I.D. device to make its number unreadable, selling or providing an
unauthorized I.D. device, and "manufacturing, selling, or providing an
identification device that so closely resembles an approved device that it is
likely to be mistaken for official identification." (Standards, p. 7.)
Thousands of enforcement agents would have to be employed to find the
potentially tens of millions of unregistered premises and violations of the
animal identification and animal tracking requirements. Indeed, beyond the
expense, the spectre of these government agents entering onto citizens'
property to find possible unregistered homes and animals brings to mind the
actions of a frightening police state, not the actions of a government agency
whose mission should be to assist rural people, not to hunt them down.
The proposed NAIS makes clear that animal owners will have to pay the costs
of registration and surveillance of their homes, farms, and livestock. ("[T]here
will be costs to producers," Plan, p. 11; "private funding will be
required. . . Producers will identify their animals and provide necessary
records to the databases. . . All groups will need to provide labor . .
.", Plan, p. 14.) In fact, the financial and labor requirements for
animal owners would be huge. Livestock owners, even the owner of one pet
horse who takes rides off the property, would have to invest in RFID reading
devices and software to report information. The Standards and Plan do not
enlighten us about the amount of these costs. Many rural people do not have
(and do not want) computers at home and even those who have them often cannot
get high-speed connections. Even if some system of written or manual
reporting were allowed as an alternative, this would only greatly increase
the labor required for citizens who elected it. Indeed, with or without
access to technology, the labor requirement would be huge.
Consider a small-to-moderate size dairy, milking 160 head. About 150 cattle
(75 bull calves, 50 cull cows, and 25 excess heifers) would leave such a farm
each year. The farmer would be required to report each tagging of an animal
and each event of an animal shipped off the farm (300 reportable events). Plus
let's assume that the farmer has 50 growing heifers outside during pasture season,
and, as heifers are prone to do, they breach the fence and go off into the
neighbor's fields twice during the season, and the farmer has to herd them
back. This results in an additional 250 reportable events ¬ 50 instances of
heifers having to be tagged (strictly speaking, the rules would require
tagging before they leave the farm -- Plan, p. 8 -- one hopes the enforcement
agents might overlook the technical violation of the farmer perhaps not being
able to tag them until they are herded back), plus 100 instances of
individual heifers leaving the farm, and 100 instances of individual heifers
returning to the farm. The farmer now has at least 550 total reportable
events, or an average of over 1.5 times per day, 365 days per year, that the
farmer must interrupt his or her other work and submit data on premises
identification, animal identification, and an event code to the USDA's
database. Further, the animals shipped from this farm would generate at least
an additional 600 reportable events per year for other stakeholders (i.e., 75
bull calves into and out of the auction house, then onto a veal farm, off the
veal farm, and to a slaughter facility (375 events); 50 cull cows into and
out of the auction house, then to a slaughter facility (150 events); and 25
heifers into and out of the auction house, then onto new farms (75 events). Thus,
only one modest-sized farm would generate well over a thousand events per
year requiring recordkeeping and reporting.
Indeed, the only economic advantage of the NAIS is an advantage to the
corporations that manufacture high-tech tags, ID equipment, and the vast
amount of hardware and software required for the system. This
"advantage" is totally outweighed by the economic costs to both
large and small segments of the livestock industry and the social and
civil-rights costs to small producers, home farmers, and non-farming animal
owners. The Department's mission should be to protect and foster agriculture,
not to protect and foster manufacturers of tagging and computing equipment.
3. Infirmities in Supposed Justifications.
The primary justifications given by the Department for the NAIS are animal
health issues, specifically, foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) and bovine
spongiform encephalopathy (BSE). (Plan, p. 1.)
There has been no FMD in the United States for over 70 years and the
possibility of its reintroduction is speculative. Of course, FMD is a viral
disease exclusively of cloven-hoofed animals and does not infect humans. Moreover,
FMD is primarily an economic disease. Animals may become temporarily lame or
refuse to eat because of the lesions caused by the virus, but nearly all
animals recover within a few weeks. Thus, the primary effects are a setback
in weight gain for animals produced for meat, reduced lactation in dairy
animals, and restrictions on exports for countries where FMD is present. NAIS
proponents need to carefully consider whether a disease of no risk to humans,
not present in the United States, and only of temporary effect to animals,
can possibly justify a gravely flawed system such as the proposed NAIS.
There have been only two known cases of BSE in the United States. There have
been no cases of humans contracting, while within the United States, the
related condition of variant Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease. The Department has
put into place all necessary safeguards and assures that the American beef
supply is safe and that transmission of BSE prions to humans cannot now occur
in the United States. After the banning of meat and bone meal from ruminant
feeds in 1997, any possible instances of BSE would now occur only in
relatively old cattle. Obviously, the number of such cattle diminishes yearly
and even assuming the longest potential lifespan of cattle, any slight
possibility of BSE in the U.S. cattle herd will disappear in about 12 to 15
years. Thus, BSE is a very low-incidence, self-limiting, rapidly disappearing
disease in the United States. BSE has not resulted in transmission of a
single case of human disease in the United States. BSE is, rather than a health
threat, primarily an economic problem affecting exports and imports of cattle
and beef. It is apparent that the Department's position that sufficient
controls are in place is correct. Thus, as with FMD, BSE cannot justify the
creation of a huge, permanent, expensive, and intrusive NAIS.
A further asserted justification is the risk of "an intentional
introduction of an animal disease." (Plan, p. 7.) Far from preventing
deliberate interference with the livestock industry or food supply, the
proposed plan creates numerous new opportunities for mayhem. The Department's
own proposals suggest that the counterfeiting and theft of tags will quickly
become a problem. (Standards, p. 7.) Application of counterfeit tags could
easily mask the introduction of a sick animal into a facility containing
thousands or tens of thousands of other animals. Consider also the scenario
in which someone brings a sick animal to a slaughter facility and falsely
reports its farm of origin as a large operation with tens of thousands of
animals in production. The resulting baseless scare has the potential to
create a huge disruption of food supplies and the profitability of animal
agriculture, regardless of whether the hoax might ultimately be discovered.
4. Lack of Consideration of Alternate Methods.
As discussed above, the NAIS is a violation of civil rights, extremely
expensive and burdensome, likely to be ineffective, and not justified by
human health, animal health, or food safety considerations. Given these
numerous and probably insurmountable flaws, the Department should carefully
consider alternative methods that would be much more successful in
accomplishing the stated objectives.
The security of America's food supply and the resilience of livestock in the
face of diseases are best served by the decentralization and dispersal of
food production and processing, and of the breeding and maintaining of
livestock. If more citizens could depend on food raised and processed within,
say, 100 miles of their homes, the danger of large-scale disruptions would be
minimized, the costs of transport would be less affected by volatile fuel
prices, and any food-borne diseases that might occur would be contained by
the natural geographic limits of the system. Similarly, if animals, such as
cattle, for example, are kept in small herds of, say, ten to a hundred
animals, infectious diseases will have much more difficulty in spreading
beyond a discrete geographical area. In this regard, the NAIS would actually
be counterproductive, since it would tend to drive more small producers and
small processors out of business. Thus, the Department should consider an
approach and programs to support and promote smaller, local herds and local
food processing.
Smaller herds would also entail the possibility of many more closed herds
than our agricultural model supports at present. Especially in dairy
operations, where artificial insemination is the norm, only modest government
incentives would be necessary to encourage small and medium sized producers
to maintain closed herds. In the case of beef cattle, and of other species
not commonly using AI, a state-level program requiring vet checks and
recordkeeping for new animals introduced to herds would be obviously far
simpler, as well as more effective, than the proposed NAIS.
Another contribution the Department could make to food safety and animal
health at low cost would be the encouragement of integrated
producer/processor operations. Despite economic and marketing forces that are
stacked against them, many small producers throughout the United States still
process and market their own dairy products, or raise meat that is processed
on site or at small local slaughterhouses and distributed directly to
consumers or to local retail outlets. Consumers love not only the high
quality of such products, but also the assurance that comes from actually
knowing the farmers who, for example, finish their steers on grass and have
the butchering done at a local small business. Very modest programs of
financial incentives and encouragements to the streamlining of federal and
state permitting procedures would help this hopeful segment of our nation's
agriculture to flourish.
Many recent developments in the agricultural sciences have demonstrated time
and again that the least-cost and least intrusive method is the most
effective and protective of health. For example, leading-edge research now
rejects the routine de-worming of all cattle and sheep, in favor of
eliminating parasite-susceptible individuals as breeding stock. The once-heralded
approach of routine de-worming, it turns out, only resulted in resistant
super-parasites and perpetuation in the gene pool of animal families
naturally subject to the largest infestations. Similarly, in recent years our
thinking has done an about-face on the subject of routine use of antibiotics
in the feed of beef steers and dairy heifers, and in udder infusions for dry
dairy cows who exhibit no clinical mastitis. Once heralded as a means of
increasing weight gain and providing extra insurance against fresh-cow
mastitis, those routine uses of antibiotics in healthy animals are now
rejected because they are known to produce resistant super-bacteria that may
cause not only animal infections, but human infections. Unfortunately, it
takes years for knowledge gained in the latest research to reach the farmer,
and the inappropriate overuse of anthelmintics and antibiotics is still very
common. Thus, another low-cost and simple initiative the Department could
undertake would be an intensive educational initiative to end the
inappropriate use of drugs in animal agriculture.
The foregoing are just a few of the many possible more effective
animal-health and food-safety initiatives to which the Department could
devote its finite resources. It is appropriate for the Department to study
fully these alternatives before concluding that a bloated NAIS bureaucracy is
our only alternative.
5. Lack of Notice and an Opportunity to be Heard for Small Farmers and Animal
Owners.
The original impetus for a nationwide animal I.D. program came from a private
membership group, the National Institute for Animal Agriculture (NIAA). (Plan,
pp. 1, 4.) The members of the NIAA include such well-known industry entities
as Cargill Meat Solutions, Monsanto Company, Schering-Plough, and the
National Pork Producers Council. Further, of those NIAA members listed as
"National Associations and Commercial Organizations," nearly 25%
appear to be manufacturers and marketers of identification technology
systems. NIAA Members. In April 2002, the NIAA
"initiated meetings that led to the development of" the NAIS. (Plan,
p. 1.) The NIAA "established a task force to provide leadership in
creating an animal identification plan." (Plan, p. 4.) The NIAA already
had been promoting animal I.D. for months before the Department, through
APHIS, became involved in the effort. Moreover, the Department says that
"[t]he development of [the Draft Program Standards] was facilitated by
significant industry feedback." (Standards, p. 1.) Essentially, a
private group has dominated animal I.D. thinking and has dictated the NAIS
plan now being proposed by the Department.
Moreover, the Department asserts a "broad support for NAIS" (Plan,
p. 1) when there is no such support. The Department says that it conducted
"listening sessions" for six months (June-November 2004) on NAIS. However,
only 60 comments were apparently made during these six months of sessions. If
the Department had made a truly widespread attempt to determine citizens'
views on animal I.D., surely it would have received far more than 60 comments
on an issue that affects tens of millions of Americans.
The Department relies upon the NIAA's survey of itself as supposed evidence
of public support. (Plan, p. 7.) The Department quotes responses from the
survey and cites NAIS as its source. (Id.) However,
when one visits that page, one finds a statement by the NIAA that the survey
is not scientific, that the survey's results are intended for use by NIAA
members only, and that any reproduction of the survey is prohibited. Thus,
the Department is presenting as "evidence" a private, unscientific
report that the public is forbidden to quote in opposition. To correct this
gross violation of normal agency procedure, the Department must immediately
publish this entire NIAA survey in the docket and issue a press release
specifying that the public is permitted to use the survey freely in studying
the relationship of the NIAA to the genesis of the NAIS. This is not only a
spurious example of "public support" but an affirmatively
misleading nothing about truly public support to say that the NIAA, an
organization of the largest livestock businesses and manufacturers of
identification equipment, considers mandatory I.D. to be good for its own
private interests.
One further troubling instance of the failure to consider the needs of the
larger public deserves mention. The NIAA lists as public institutional
members some state departments of agriculture and animal health commissions. These
include representatives of several states with significant populations of
members of plain faiths, e.g., Pennsylvania, New York, Ohio, Indiana,
Michigan, Wisconsin, Missouri, and Iowa. Yet it appears no consideration
whatsoever was given to the fact that the NAIS as proposed would violate the
right of these citizens to practice their religion without government
hindrance. Thus, the NAIS is not the result of any true consensus or concern
for the welfare of the citizenry as a whole. Rather, the NAIS is the
predictable result of allowing a small coterie of financially interested
"stakeholders" to create the agenda for animal identification.
Conclusion
The NAIS proposals as embodied in the Standards and Plan are unworkable
because of economic costs, the huge burdens of reporting, and enormous and
needless complexity. Their justifications based on animal diseases and food
safety would not be served but in fact would be harmed by the NAIS. The
Department has failed to consider numerous alternative methods that might
actually further animal health and food security without the vast problems of
the proposed NAIS. The Department has limited any input on the NAIS chiefly
to a small group of parties with a preexisting bias toward mandatory animal
ID; the Department did not make its plans known to small farming interest
groups and did not seek any input from such groups. Last, and first, the most
fatal flaw of the proposed NAIS is its disregard for fundamental human rights
enshrined in our Constitution: the right to religious freedom, the right of
property ownership, the right of privacy.
Not since Prohibition has any government agency attempted to enshrine in law
a system, which so thoroughly stigmatizes and burdens common, everyday
behavior and is so certain to meet with huge resistance from the citizens it
unjustly targets. Therefore, the Department should:
(1) withdraw the present Standards and Plan as failing to embody a fair or
workable system;
(2) reconsider whether, particularly in light of the present effective
measures against BSE, any animal I.D. scheme is warranted at present;
(3) consider implementing the low cost and easily undertaken measures that
would more effectively protect animal health, human health, and the food
supply;
(4) review its procedures for development of programs such as NAIS to correct
the limitation of input to self-selected groups and the failure to notify the
vast majority of affected parties; and
(5) institute procedures to assure that, in the future, proposed programs
will not be permitted to threaten the constitutional rights of citizens.
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