Opinion ID: 3039597
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Statutory and Regulatory Backdrop

Text: Congress enacted the AWA in 1966 “to insure that animals intended for use in research facilities or for exhibition purposes or for use as pets are provided humane care and treatment . . . .” 7 U.S.C. § 2131(1). As originally enacted, the AWA left research facilities largely unregulated. See, e.g., 7 U.S.C. § 2143(a) (repealed 1985). In 1985, Congress amended the AWA by enacting the Improved Standards for Laboratory Animals Act, Pub. L. No. 99-198, 99 Stat. 1645. This amendment to the AWA instructed the USDA to “promulgate standards to govern the humane handling, care, treatment, and transportation of animals by dealers, research facilities, and exhibitors.” 7 U.S.C. § 2143(a)(1). These stanANIMAL LEGAL DEFENSE v. VENEMAN 18745 dards must “include minimal requirements . . . for a physical environment adequate to promote the psychological wellbeing of primates.” Id. § 2143(a)(2)(B). The Secretary proposed a regulation containing these standards in 1989. See Animal Welfare — Standards, 54 Fed. Reg. 10897, 10917 (proposed Mar. 15, 1989). The 1989 proposed regulation would have imposed a number of detailed “minimum requirements” on regulated entities. These included, for example, a requirement that “nonhuman primates must be housed in primary enclosures with compatible members of the same species or with compatible members of other nonhuman primate species” unless doing so would endanger the animal. 54 Fed. Reg. at 10944. As finally adopted in 1991, however, the regulation, which requires regulated entities to create an “Environmental Enhancement Plan” to benefit nonhuman primates, left the requirements for these “primary enclosures” more vaguely defined. See generally 56 Fed. Reg. 6426 (1991), codified at 9 C.F.R. § 3.81. The social grouping provision of the regulation, for example, contains no specific instruction regarding the pairing or grouping of animals. It leaves regulated entities considerable discretion to house nonhuman primates as they see fit, provided that housing conditions accord with “currently accepted professional standards, as cited in appropriate professional journals or reference guides, and as directed by the attending veterinarian.” 9 C.F.R. § 3.81(a). In 1991, the ALDF challenged § 3.81 in the federal district court for the District of Columbia, arguing that the regulation violated the AWA by failing to impose minimum standards for nonhuman primate conditions of confinement. In a decision later upheld by the D.C. Circuit, the district court concluded that at least one of the plaintiffs had standing to challenge the regulation based on an aesthetic injury he suffered from witnessing the conditions of several nonhuman primates’ confinement. This plaintiff had “ ‘been employed and/ or worked as a volunteer for various human and animal relief 18746 ANIMAL LEGAL DEFENSE v. VENEMAN and rescue organizations’ ” “[f]or his entire adult life.” Animal Legal Def. Fund, Inc. v. Glickman, 154 F.3d 426, 429 (D.C. Cir. 1998) (en banc) (“Glickman I”). This plaintiff had visited a “game farm” covered by the statute at least nine times, and had seen primates “living under inhumane conditions” at the farm. Id. For example, he saw a large male chimpanzee held in an isolated area. He stated in an affidavit that he knew that chimpanzees “ ‘are very social animals and it upset [him] very much to see’ ” this chimpanzee “ ‘in isolation from other primates.’ ” Id. (alteration in original). The district court struck down § 3.81 as arbitrary and capricious and contrary to law. Animal Legal Def. Fund v. Sec. of Agric., 813 F. Supp. 882, 892 (D.D.C. 1993). Reversing this decision in 2000, the D.C. Circuit concluded that “[n]othing in the [AWA’s] statutory mandate required greater specificity” than the allegedly vague requirements the regulation imposed. See Animal Legal Def. Fund, Inc. v. Glickman, 204 F.3d 229, 235 (D.C. Cir. 2000) (“Glickman II”).