372 HUMANE TREATMENT OF ANIMALS USED IN RESEARCH 
The University of Michigan, 
Mental Health Research Institute, 
Ann Arbor, Mich., October 4 , 1962. 
Hon. Kenneth A. Roberts, 
House Office Building, 
Washington, D.C. 
Dear Mr. Roberts : I hope that the following statement can be included in 
a record of the hearings on the Moulder and Griffiths bills : 
“Dear Congressman Roberts, allow me to express to you my very deep con- 
viction that incalculable harm would be done by any form of legislation which 
puts further limitations upon animal research beyond those ethical constraints 
now in operation. Most of the remarkable advances of medicine, pharmacology, 
and the basic biological sciences within recent decades have been based funda- 
mentally upon animal research. Without such research the prolongation of 
human life and the decrease in illness and the improved living conditions of 
our modern age would have been utterly impossible. In my professional and 
scientific lifetime I have had an opportunity to visit many of the chief research 
centers in this country and many others. I have seen at first hand that in- 
variably the care of animals is humane, in terms of the well-recognized ethical 
standards for animal care which are universally known throughout the scientific 
community. In my estimation these ethical constraints constitute sufficient 
policing. Animals are not needlessly sacrificed nor are they needlessly subjected 
to pain or other unpleasant circumstances. Everything consistent with the 
purposes of research is done to guarantee their comfort. 
“It seems to me unthinkable in the 20th century that Congress should give 
any serious attention to the limitation of animal research which has contributed 
so much to human betterment.” 
Respectfully yours, 
James G. Miller, M.D., Ph. D., 
Director. 
Virginia Polytechnic Institute, 
Blacksburg, Va., October 5, 1962. 
Hon. Kenneth A. Roberts, 
Chairman, Subcommittee on Health and Safety, 
House of Representatives, Washington, D.C. 
My Dear Mr. Roberts : I am writing in connection with H.R. 1937, known as 
the Griffiths bill, and H.R. 3556, known as the Moulder bill. I hope my com- 
ments can be included in the testimony on these two bills. Dr. H. T. Cox, execu- 
tive director of the American Institute of Biological Sciences, has informed me 
that this procedure has been cleared with the committee’s staff chief. 
I agree that all animals used in research should be comfortably housed, well 
fed, and humanely handled. In fact, only when animals are so handled are the 
results of research valid. Scientists who must depend upon animal experimenta- 
tion to obtain facts and develop principles for the benefit of mankind are as much 
concerned about the welfare of their animals as is anyone else. The abuses 
which the bills purport to correct are in the extreme minority. 
I feel that the proposed legislation is unnecessary in the first place and, if 
passed, will create an enormous burden on an already overworked group of scien- 
tists. There is no doubt that progress in developing facts needed to alleviate 
human suffering and disease and insuring an adequate food supply for an under- 
nourished world would be seriously impeded. 
The research program of our agricultural experiment station, and others like 
it in every State, would be severely hampered by such legislation. Our animal 
genetics studies designed to improve breeds, our studies of nutrition designed to 
improve diets and feeding practices, our research in veterinary science which is 
concerned with developing effective methods for controlling animal diseases, and 
our studies of methods of controlling parasites and insects attacking animals are 
examples of our research program that would be unduly, and I believe unneces- 
sarily, hampered. The end loser, of course, is mankind. 
Finally, there are, I would guess, two or three hundred thousand persons who 
are doing research that would come under the proposed legislation. I seriously 
question the wisdom of legislation, requiring large expenditures of money, and 
imposing unnecessary restrictions on scientists that, in the final analysis, is 
aimed at correcting abuses by a very small number of persons in large groups. 
Respectfully yours, 
Wilson B. Bell, Dean of Agriculture. 
