Witnessing a Paradigm Shift: Securing Rights for Nonhuman Animals

One night in September last fall, my life changed a bit. I had attended a fashion week event in NYC not thinking too much of it, but had decided to go since the make-up company hosting it is up to a lot of good. However, I would return home that night a slightly new person, for I had learned about the story of Happy.

In this piece of our Optimist in Action series, Matthew sits down with Elizabeth Stein, the lawyer acting on behalf of Happy in her legal case. A case that, despite its loss, made history.

I should probably mention that Happy is an elephant and that this legal case was the first ever to make it to the Court of Appeals representing the rights of a non-human animal.

An elephant in the courtroom? Does this mean we’re turning the tide on Universal rights? Not just for all human beings, but for all the beautiful creatures on this planet that aren’t us too? Could this be the beginning to the end of a cruel and single-lined system that mostly, if not solely, benefits humankind?

We saw a tremendous win last winter when the 30x30 agreement was passed. What’s followed are new conversations on how to make nature investable. Not by extracting from it, but by keeping it as is. In other words, we might be looking at a near future when nature is finally recognized as more valuable when it’s kept and tended to instead of turned it into something else (say materials or goods.)

That’s profound change!

And as for Happy, will her story of suffering lead to less suffering for elephants and animals kept in captivity around the world? Read on for the interview with Elizabeth Stein.

This post is part of our Optimist In Action series, featuring stories of people, companies, and organizations working for positive change. The interview and piece were conducted and written by Matthew Gutierrez.

Happy the Elephant

Last year, New York’s highest court ruled that an Asian elephant named Happy is not a person, legally, and thus cannot have a fundamental human right. Happy, who has been at the Bronx Zoo for over 40 years, would remain in captivity. 

But attorney Elizabeth Stein, who worked on the case for the Nonhuman Rights Project, says the decision marked a step forward for animals worldwide. 

“We have opened up this conversation of animal rights,” Stein told The Climate Optimist this past fall.

“They say timing is everything, which I wholeheartedly believe. What’s happening now couldn’t have happened 30 years ago because our cases are built on recent science and developments.” 

“Changing any kind of civil rights movement is slow,” Stein continued. “It's incremental. It’s not necessarily getting an entire court to agree with you or an entire legislature to agree, but it’s getting people to understand what we’re talking about.”

Stein, litigation director for the Nonhuman Rights Project, says she and her team will keep pushing, keep fighting, and keep searching for more equality for nonhuman animals. That’s why Steven M. Wise founded the organization in 1995 dedicated solely to securing legal rights for nonhuman animals. Today, Jane Goodall sits on its board, and it’s working. 

In this conversation, Stein shares Happy the Elephant’s lasting impact, animal rights progress, and what gives her hope. 

When you think about Happy the Elephant, what thoughts and feelings arise?

What’s incredible is that we got to the court of appeals because it’s the highest court of the State of New York. It’s not an automatic appeal. Very few cases are accepted by the court. 

Were you aware of the long odds headed into the case?

I have a lot of friends who are attorneys who said “Liz, this is a great cause, but the Court of Appeals is never going to hear it.” But they did hear it. And it was the first time the Court of Appeals heard an animal rights case. So this is a landmark decision, and nobody ever thought they’d hear it. We were determined to get it there.

Judge Jenny Rivera said keeping Happy the Elephant in her captivity at the Bronx Zoo is antithetical to justice and that she should be released. And we just had a piece of legislation passed by the Ojai City Council in California, which became the first city in the U.S. to recognize the legal right of a nonhuman animal. We believe our case with Happy helped foster that reality. 

Do you feel proud of the progress in animal rights?

We’ve had stories written about our clients, captivity, zoos, and the unjust nature of keeping animals behind bars. The more it’s out there, the more people talk about it, and the more people think twice about it. 

So you’re raising the public’s consciousness about animal rights in many ways. What are some changes you’ve seen anecdotally?

People ask themselves:

Why are we going to the zoo? Why do we look down on a shell of an elephant? What’s being accomplished here?

Certainly, there’s no educational element because whoever is sitting on the monorail is just there with their bucket of popcorn and that’s fine, but it shouldn’t be at the expense of Happy. You’re not really learning about the elephant. You’re not learning about what elephants should be doing as elephants. You’re also not being told about the elephants’ suffering because clearly, it’s not in their interest to tell zoo visitors that. 

Much of our work has an educational component. We want to teach people. Elephants are smart; they live in packs when they travel. They grieve and mourn the dead. People don’t realize that when they see an elephant standing at the zoo plodding their feet and swaying their trunk, they’re not doing a happy dance. How do I know this? Because of our experts. I think of myself as a mouthpiece of the experts, who have studied elephants for decades, both in captivity and in the wild. 

What can people do to help? Not go to the zoo? Read up on animals?

Go to our website. Follow us on Instagram and Facebook. We can’t do it all, but we’ll assist people who go to their local governments to try to get similar legislation passed. We have a lot of supporters who protest at the Bronx Zoo. We have events.

I imagine you don’t go to the zoo every summer. 

I have four grandsons, none of whom are allowed to go to the zoo or aquarium. Someone once told me how it was such a nice day to go to the zoo. I said you could go bowling, go to the movies, read a book, play baseball, go to the park. 

There are a million things to do. There was just a fabulous article in Vox about animals being for our entertainment when they’re kept in zoos. You can spend millions of dollars making the exhibits look nicer to the human eye, so that humans feel better, but that doesn’t mean it’s a healthy environment for the animals.

An elephant is still in that horrible one-acre captivity. The elephant should be traveling miles and miles and miles a day. 

How did you begin your work with law and animal rights?

After law school, I went into banking. I was a corporate lawyer at a major bank. When I had children, I wanted to stay home with them. But after they got older, I wanted to go back to work, but not in banking. I knew I loved animals, and I wanted to protect animals.

I used to represent people who protested animal shelters to get them to change their policies. But then I realized we had to have welfare laws that would make captivity a little better, so I thought about animal rights. 

One day Steven Wise, founder of the Nonhuman Rights Project, led a lecture with law students.  

And boy, it all made sense when I heard him. At the end, he said he needed volunteer lawyers. I emailed him. I said to myself: He’ll never get back to me. Moments after I emailed him, he replied: “When can we speak?” Since then, Steve and I have been inseparable. 

Is there a particular group in the animal rights community that gives you hope?

The Nonhuman Rights Project gives me a huge amount of hope. What’s remarkable about that project is that we are truly the only organization dedicated solely to rights for nonhuman animals. It’s not welfare work; only rights work, which isn’t the case for other organizations that primarily do welfare work and then dabble in rights.

What makes you optimistic, or hopeful, about the climate or animal rights?

We feel animal rights are an uphill battle, but we feel it’s a winnable battle. And we’re getting there. We believe we are making such great strides. I’ve never seen a team work as closely as we do, and it’s our responsibility to keep this momentum going. 

I was talking to some lovely law students a year or two ago and they said to me, boy, it’s so nice to talk to somebody who isn’t a cynic, who isn’t a pessimist, who really believes that there is some light at the end of the tunnel.

And when it comes to Happy and all the other animals kept in captivity around the world, we hope there’s a lot of light at the end of their tunnel! Learn more about Happy and her story in this article in The Atlantic.

Climate Optimism

• Climate scientist Mark Maslin: ‘We have all the technology we need to move to a cleaner, renewable world’ — The Guardian
• Major wins in the US: Biden-Harris Administration Announces Temporary Pause on Pending Approvals of Liquefied Natural Gas Exports — The White House
• New show airs on BloombergTV on Feb 8th: An Optimist’s Guide to The Planet with Game of Thrones actor Nikolai Coster-Waldau — ABC News