Gov Christie vetoes Ban of Pig Gestation Crates [View all]

Wayne Pacelle: Humane Society US




Nov 18 2013

Crack Job by Cracker Barrel Shareholders

When shareholders want to see movement inside a company they invest in, they sometimes submit shareholder resolutions. For years, animal welfare advocates and organizations like The HSUS have been doing just that, specifically when we want the company to improve its animal-care or animal-purchasing practices. Today, for the first time, a shareholder proposal on an animal welfare topic passed, almost unanimously. That vote is a telling sign of the emerging societal consensus on the extreme confinement of breeding sows in gestation crates. People just don’t like them.

Rather than criticizing a company for not doing something a certain way, the proposal praised Cracker Barrel Old Country Store, the iconic middle-America restaurant chain based with more than 600 outlets, for recently announcing plans to eliminate gestation crates – small cages used to virtually immobilize breeding pigs for months on end – from its pork supply chain.

P.S. Unfortunately, politicians are often laggards on important social issues. Look at the history of women’s suffrage, civil rights and so many other topics.

In New Jersey today, Gov. Chris Christie has, for the moment at least, thwarted our effort to override his veto of the Legislature’s sentiment that it seeks to ban gestation crates. We fell just two votes short of the two-thirds vote needed to override his veto. It appears that Gov. Christie is more focused on appeasing Republican caucus-goers in Iowa than the people of New Jersey, who oppose gestation crates with a 91 percent supermajority. He may have miscalculated attitudes in Iowa, however. Polling from all major pig-producing states, including Iowa, reveals broad-based opposition to immobilizing animals in these crates. We’re not done yet in New Jersey.




http://hsus.typepad.com/wayne/2013/11/crack-job-by-cracker-barrel-shareholders.html