The incessant ferment at the clinic attracts a dedicated student following. Some, sharing Mr. Francione's passion, entered Rutgers Law School specifically to attend. Some were persuaded by his argument that the fight for animal rights parallels the fight for civil rights. And some are like Sgt. William L. Tomaszewski, a Jersey City police officer who was drawn to the clinic because he enjoyed wrangling with Mr. Francione in other law classes.
Cases come in many forms.
The defense of Taro, the New Jersey death-row dog pardoned by Gov. Christine Todd Whitman in 1994, was in part fashioned here. He selects cases in consultation with his wife, Anna E. Charlton, the clinic's staff attorney and co-director. A convicted South Carolina murderer, newly converted to a faith that condemns killing, wants to sue the prison system so he can have a meatless diet. A Pennsylvania clinic hopes to block a hunt to thin the deer population in Philadelphia's affluent western suburbs. And a New Jersey clinic plans to challenge the 1993 Hunter Harassment Law, which makes verbal abuse of hunters a crime.