It looks like, in 2016, our state’s ballot will ask voters whether a chick deserves enough space to stretch her wings.
Last week, Massachusetts received 130,000 signatures of voters who want a farm animal protection question on the ballot—twice the required number. This initiative received more signatures than any other pro-animal initiative in Massachusetts so far. HLS students helped gather signatures on and off campus. Now the Secretary of the Commonwealth just needs to approve the votes.
A factory farm generally keeps a baby calf used for veal, a pregnant pig forced to breed more pigs, or a hen used for eggs in a cage too small for the animal to even turn around. Some merciful states have begun to ban such extreme confinement. Massachusetts voters can soon give our state’s animals some space, too.
(I call a hen used for eggs a chick because the egg industry will kill her so young. A bird’s body quickly gets worn out from factory farm life. The egg industry thus considers a hen useless at just a year or two old. In nature, a chicken could live ten to fifteen years.)