HUMANE TREATMENT OF ANIMALS USED IN RESEARCH 345 
The claim has been made that British scientists are satisfied with the law, 
since no serious effort has been made by them to either repeal or amend the law. 
They have considered the advisability of attempting to obtain changes, but there 
is one reason that is sufficient to explain their failure to do so. 
One does not have a bill introduced into a legislative assembly unless there is 
a remote possibility of its passage. If there exists an organized group whose 
strength is likely to be sufficient to defeat such a bill, it is better not to introduce 
it because its defeat would serve only to increase the strength of the opposition. 
The convincing argument against the possible success of obtaining a change in 
the British law has been the strength of the antivivisectionists. By continually 
seeking more restrictive legislation, the antivivisectionists have kept British 
scientists on the defensive. 
The Research Defense Society was founded by the scientists in 1908. The 
following extract is quoted from a pamphlet issued by this society in 1957 ; in 
1938 after the defeat of a dog’s protection bill for the fourth time in the pre- 
ceding 18 years, “This was the first time the question of amending the Dog’s 
Act of 1906 was seriously considered. It was brought up at this time and on 
many subsequent occasions, but even the extreme exigencies of wartime condi- 
tions were not enough to overcome the reluctance of the authorities to risk a 
bitter dogfight for smoothing the path of the physiologists. (The Dog’s Act of 
1906 prohibited public pounds from making dogs available for research.) 
The strength of the antivivisection movement as it existed in 1957 is indicated 
in the same pamphlet of the Research Defense Society from which I quote : 
“They have their shops and publish their literature ; they have stalls in animal 
shows ; they organize national and international conferences ; number peers and 
Members of Parliament among their supporters ; get questions regularly asked 
in Parliament; persecute pet shops and animal dealers who try to do business 
with laboratories ; collaborate with the Royal Society for the Prevention of 
Cruelty to Animals (a theoretically neutral body) in the production of anti- 
vivisectionist films and produce antivivisectionist plays and literature galore.” 
Cruelty to animals was not the real issue when the British law was passed. 
The law did not prevent noblemen from hunting fox and fowl ; it did not pre- 
vent trapping live rabbits and bringing them alive to the market with broken 
legs ; it did not apply to vivisection practiced at farm places where “each year 
more than a million male and female animals have sensitive organs cut out of 
their bodies in full consciousness.” (Evidence Royal Commission 1906.) Their 
law permits a man to drown an unwanted puppy, but would hold him in violation 
if he made any scientific observation while the puppy drowned, unless he had a 
license and certificate. The real issue was the antivivisection movement, 
directed solely against a professional group of scientific investigators and 
teachers. 
The British are noted for their skill at compromise, but not always for their 
vision. In this instance their vision was faulty. They expected to appease 
the antivivisectionists by restricting and encumbering scientific research ; and 
they paid the physiologists by protecting them from prosecution by the antivivi- 
sectionists. Instead, they gave the antivivisectionists stature and the number of 
their societies increased. 
With greater vision the British might have foreseen the consequences of their 
law. With greater foresight and courage Britain could have protected her 
scientists from legal prosecution by the antivivisectionists as she actually did, 
without a compromise. But Britain was willing to pay the price. 
The argument has been made that the quality of British research has not 
suffered under the British law. There is no question on that score. Work of 
good quality can be done by dedicated scientists even under adverse conditions. 
Lord Lister, the father of aseptic surgery did such research, but in 1898 when this 
country was faced with a bill in Congress to restrict animal experimentation, he 
wrote Dr. W. W. Keen in Philadelphia, “I am grieved to learn that there should 
be even a remote chance of the legislature in any State of the Union passing a 
bill regulating experiments upon animals. Our law on the subject should never 
have been passed and ought to be repealed. It serves no good purpose and inter- 
feres seriously with inquiries which are of paramount importance to man.” 
(Lord Lister, by Douglas Guthrie, Livingstone Ltd., Edinborough 1949.) 
The real question concerning the effect of the law on research involves not only 
the quality of research but the total output of research, to which many men 
must contribute. What the loss has been in the total productivity of British 
science is hard to reckon. There is evidence that science has suffered. 
