However, I think as the packers in the room may verify, approximately 40 to 45 percent of the brains are available. Mr. POAGE. So that brings this question: Why is it that you get more brains that are not salable from this than you do with a hammer? Mr. MACFARLANE. You do not. When you use a hammer, if the hammer is used more than once on a head, you usually smash or ruin the brain completely. Mr. POAGE. That is what I was talking about the first time. You get the same. Mr. MACFARLANE. You get hemorrhaging. Mr. POAGE. You get concussion there. Mr. MACFARLANE. That is right. I think the percentage of bloody brain by comparing the hammer with this, in all fairness to the man who uses the hammer properly and can do the job with one blow, which is not the national average by any means, would be that the brain of an animal stunned with the hammer properly would show less hemorrhaging than the brain of one stunned with this. Mr. POAGE. Would it not be true that you would have exactly the same hemorrhaging in proportion to the power of the concussion? In other words, if you put less powder in your blank cartridge, you could get a slighter blow or a heavier blow, as you see fit? Mr. MACFARLANE. Yes, sir; it can be done and is being done now. We are experimenting with powder loads ranging from less than 1 grain to 4 grains of powder. As you all in this room know, the type of livestock slaughtered in the United States will vary between one section and another. Where they are slaughtering Angus steers, for instance, you will need a much more powerful load, than you would in New England where we kill dairy cattle. And the damage to the brain is always to the opposite side of the brain from the point of impact, which is true in humans. If someone were to hit us on the head, the opposite point, the rear of the area struck, would show hemorrhaging. That is true in animals. Mr. POAGE. That is true when you are hit with the hammer? Mr. POAGE. Thank you very much. Dr. BARNER. I have an additional remark, a very short one, I might add. I have made reference to a glass window in our veterinary post mortem diagnostic laboratory. We have an additional glass window in our newly constructed meats laboratory wherein students are in the process of destroying animals and carrying on with the other work of a meats department. And I might say that at the present time Mrs. Christine Stevens, of the Animal Welfare Institute, and members of the animal husbandry department of Michigan State are negotiating with the idea in mind that we might be able to install a carbon dioxide immobilizing unit which I understand now has been placed on the market by Allbright-Nell, wherein a small unit, 60 hogs and under per hour could be immobilized at a cost of for this particular unit $3,500. We hope to install one at Michigan State. Mr. POAGE. I overlooked one other witness. I wonder if you would stand by a minute. Mr. Milburn is present; there has been a change on the list. We will therefore now hear him. STATEMENT OF G. R. "JACK" MILBURN, GRASSRANGE, MONT., FIRST VICE PRESIDENT AND CHAIRMAN, LEGISLATIVE COMMITTEE, AMERICAN NATIONAL CATTLEMEN'S ASSOCIATION Mr. MILBURN. Mr. Chairman and gentlemen, I have a statement here that I think I can go through hurriedly. I am G. R. "Jack" Milburn. I operate a cattle ranch near Grassrange, Mont., on which I raise commercial and purebred Aberdeen Angus cattle. I am first vice president of the American National Cattlemen's Association and chairman of their legislative committee. I wanted to emphasize the fact that I live on this ranch. That is the only business I am occupied in. And I have lived with the cattle industry since 1919. That is all I know. The American National Cattlemen's Association was organized in 1898. It is a voluntary association representing 28 State cattlemen's associations, more than 100 local and regional groups, and thousands of individual cattlemen. At the 60th annual convention in Phoenix, Ariz., January 6-10, 1957, the association passed the following resolution: RESOLUTION No. 11-HUMANE SLAUGHTERING Whereas the American Humane Association is backing legislation to force drastic changes in the methods of slaughtering food animals; and Whereas the packers have for some time cooperated in a joint committee with the American Humane Association in improving methods of handling livestock: Therefore be it Resolved, That we strongly favor humane treatment of livestock, but urge that progress in this matter be made through continued cooperation of packers and the humane association rather than through legislation. In support of this resolution I wish to emphasize that cattlemen, by their very nature, are lovers of animals. If they were not, they would not be in the business. They, more than any other group, are interested in the humane handling of cattle from the time they are calved on the range until converted into beef. We are in sympathy with the groups and individuals seeking to improve humane handling, transportation, and slaughter of cattle. However, we feel that we must oppose enactment of H. R. 3029 at this time for a number of reasons, but particularly because cooperation and education will accomplish more than compulsory legislation toward achieving our common goal. We believe that such principles embodied, for instance, in legislation similar to H. R. 5820 will have a better chance of accomplishing these objectives. Humaneness to animals is a matter of education, training and a moral philosophy-not compulsory legislation. More can be accomplished through a practical approach incorporating humane problems with good economic and efficient production of meat-an approach that is already on its way. Since the beginning of the cattle business, there has been a steady improvement in the care and handling of cattle. Cattlemen long ago learned that the best-cared-for cattle are the most profitable. Facilities for their care and feeding have been and are being constantly improved. Cattlemen are cooperating with railroads and truckers toward more humane handling of the stock between the ranch and the stockyards. Stockyards facilities are being improved constantly to avoid injury or death to livestock. The American Humane Association and the meatpackers as individual firms and associations, particularly the American Meat Institute, have been working for some time toward the development of improved methods of slaughter which are practical and humane and which invite general acceptance by the entire packing industry. This cooperative effort is making real progress. In view of this effective voluntary cooperation, we believe that the injection of compulsory legislation would only complicate an already complex situation, which can best be worked out through mutual understanding of the economic and humane problems that are involved. We urge your committee to allow the joint committee of the American Humane Association and the meatpackers to continue the work that is so well started without being hampered by restrictive legislation at this time. We who live with the cattle and raise them-raise them from calfhood to the time we sell them, and the best cattlemen, the majority of the cattlemen are very much concerned as to their welfare and their life on the ranch and their shipping and the slaughtering of them. So I think it is needless to say that we should be considered as very much interested in the best and most humane method of destroying or slaughtering of livestock. But we feel, as has been so well expressed by Dr. Clarkson of the Department of Agriculture, that your H. 3029 is a little bit drastic, it is compulsory. More time should be taken; that we approve of the wording of a bill or similar bill to H. R. 3820. And we feel that a little more time is needed for study, to determine the very best method of slaughtering. Mr. POAGE. Thank you very much. Mr. MILLBURN. Thank you. Mr. POAGE. Now we will call Mr. Leo Pfeffer, and following Mr. Pfeffer I will ask Mrs. Griffiths to introduce a witness. STATEMENT OF LEO PFEFFER, ATTORNEY, NEW YORK, N. Y. Mr. PFEFFER. Mr. Chairman, in order to save the committee's time all of the Jewish organizations have decided to combine in one statement and that statement will be presented by Rabbi Lewin. But for the record I would like to indicate the presence of the delegates of the Jewish organizations, so that the names will be incorporated in the record. Present here, although not testifying, will be Rabbi Michael Munk of the Research Institute; Mr. Ben Weitzer, legislative representative of the Jewish War Veterans; Rabbi Emanuel Holtzer of the Rabbi Council; Rabbi Davis Penitz of the Rabbinical Assembly, United Synagogue; Mr. Joseph M. Viener of the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations; and Rabbi Pincas Teitz, of the Union of Orthodox Rabbis of the United States and Canada. My name is Leo Pfeffer. I am acting as attorney for the 21 or so Jewish organizations who are listed on our statement, representing by far the overwhelming majority of members of the American Jewish community. I would suggest at least 80 percent of them. The combined statements of all of the organizations, as I said, to save the committee's time, will be presented by Rabbi Isaac Lewin, who is a member of the executive committee of the Union of Orthodox Rabbis of the United States and Canada. He is a professor at the Yeshiva University at New York, a permanent representative to the Economic Council of the United Nations and a various number of Jewish organizations. If there are any questions-should there be-asked after he testifies, I will be happy to answer them. But the statement will be presented by Rabbi Lewin. STATEMENT OF RABBI ISAAC LEWIN, MEMBER OF THE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE OF THE UNION OF ORTHODOX RABBIS OF THE UNITED STATES AND CANADA, AND PROFESSOR AT YESHIVA UNIVERSITY, NEW YORK; ACCOMPANIED BY RABBI PINCAS TEITZ Rabbi LEWIN. My name is Rabbi Isaac Lewin. I am a member of the executive committee of the Union of Orthodox Kabbis of the United States and Canada and professor of Yeshiva University, New York. I speak today on behalf of the following Jewish organizations who join in this statement: Agudas Harabbanim (Union of Orthodox Rabbis of the United States and Canada); Agudas Israel World Organization, American Section; Agudath Israel of America; American Jewish Congress; Association of Grand Rabbis; Central Conference of American Rabbis: Jewish Labor Committee: Jewish War Veterans of the U. S. A.: Mizrachi and Hapoel Hamizrachi of America; National Council of Young Israel; New York Board of Rabbis; Poale Agudath Israel of America; Rabbinical Alliance of America; Rabbinical Assembly of America; Rabbinical Board of Greater New York; Rabbinical Council of America; Research Institute of Religious Jewry; Synagogue Council of America; Union of American Hebrew Congregations; Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America; United Synagogue of America; and the National Community Relations Advisory Council, which is a coordinating agency for some of the above national organizations and 36 regional, State, and local Jewish community councils throughout the country. On behalf of these organizations, I am here to state our opposition to bills H. R. 176, H. R. 2880, H. R. 3029, H. R. 3049, H. R. 6422, and H. R. 6509. We oppose these bills because all of them give a completely false impression of the Jewish kosher method of slaughtering animals (shehitah) and may become the basis of restriction against one of the most important precepts of the Jewish faith, thus endangering a primary civil liberty-freedom of religion. Bills H. R. 176 and H. R. 2880 provide for stunning of livestock prior to its slaughtering by— mechanical, electrical, chemical, or other means determined by the Secretary (of Agriculture) to be rapid, effective, and humane. In the case of poultry, the bills require that the fowl be firstrendered insensible by the severing of the head from the body or by an electrical or other means determined by the Secretary (of Agriculture) to be rapid, effective, and humane. Paragraph (c) of section 2 then provides that the requirements of this section shall not apply to any individual slaughtering in accordance with the requirements of any established religious faith. Bill H. R. 3029 has a different text. It mentions three "approved" methods of slaughtering. The first is after stunning— by mechanical, electrical, chemical, or other means determined by the Secretary to be rapid, effective, and humane. The second, referring to poultry, is that of— instantaneous severing of the head from the body or, if poultry is otherwise cut or stuck, by first rendering such poultry insensible by mechanical, electrical, or other means determined by the Secretary to be rapid, effective, and humane. The third is slaughtering in accordance with the requirements of any religious faith. Bill H. R. 3049 recognizes two so-called "humane methods of slaughtering" which are equivalent to the first two "approved methods" of bill H. R. 3029, with the added clause: Provided, however, That nothing in this act shall prohibit slaughtering in accordance with the practices and requirements of the Jewish religious faith by a qualified slaughterer, commonly called a shohet, authorized to engage in such slaughtering by an ordained rabbi of the Jewish religious faith. There can be no doubt that in formulating the bill as a general rule providing for the use of humane methods in the slaughter of livestock and poultry, with an exception for the individual slaughtering in accordance with the requirements of any established religious faith as in some bills (H. R. 176 and 2880) are for the slaughtering in accordance with the practices and requirements of the Jewish religious faith by a qualified slaughterer, commonly called a shohet, authorized to engage in such slaughtering by an ordained rabbi of the Jewish religious faith as in other bills-there arises the inescapable implication that— slaughtering in accordance with the requirements of any established religious faith or slaughtering in accordance with the practices and requirements of the Jewish religious faith are inhumane but are permitted only because they are prescribed by religion. This false and defamatory implication must be categorically rejected. Jewish religious practices require that any animal whose meat is to be used for food must be slaughtered in accordance with specific and detailed requirements. |