Thanks to countless hours of grassroots efforts by more than 1,000 dedicated volunteers, including many MFA members, enough signatures have been collected to place an important animal welfare measure on the Massachusetts 2016 ballot. 





Right now, pregnant pigs are forced to live in cages so small they can’t turn around for months at a time.  Currently, hens used for eggs spend the majority of their lives unable to spread their wings.  And at this moment, calves raised for veal are chained by their necks in tiny crates. 





If passed, however, this measure would require that pigs, chickens, and calves have enough room to turn around, stand up, lie down, and freely extend their limbs, effectively banning gestation crates, battery cages, and veal crates.  It would also ban the sale of pork, eggs, and veal from intensively confined animals raised outside of Massachusetts. 





More than 130,000 signatures of Massachusetts residents have just been submitted to the Secretary of the Commonwealth as part of a historic campaign to ban the most extreme confinement of pigs, calves, and hens in the state’s factory farms .  That’s more than twice as many signatures as needed to place the measure on the ballot. 





With so many compassionate people speaking out, it’s never been clearer that the days are numbered for the factory farming industry’s cruelest practices.