ACLU Goes to Court to Protect PETA's First Amendment Rights

Update
In a decisive victory for PETA's right to expose the suffering of elephants in circuses, a federal judge has ruled that the D.C. Commission on the Arts and Humanities violated PETA's First Amendment rights last year when it tried to stop the group from displaying a shackled, crying circus-elephant statue in the city's public "Party Animals" art display. The judge's ruling also orders the arts commission to pay PETA $4,000 in damages.

In his ruling, Judge Richard J. Leon of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia stated several times that the arts commission's arguments for excluding PETA's elephant "strained credulity." PETA intends to use the award to further rescue efforts for suffering elephants currently held by the Hawthorn Corporation, a major supplier of elephants to circuses and a notoriously frequent violator of the federal Animal Welfare Act.

Read the text of Judge Leon's ruling here. (PDF Format)

Ella PhantzPeril Joins the Herd
On a day that marked a victory both for the First Amendment and for animals in circuses, PETA’s “sad” elephant was placed on display in our nation’s capital at the corner of Connecticut Avenue and Q Street in Dupont Circle. Circuses do all they can to keep animal suffering hidden behind the scenes, but PETA’s elephant exposes the pain and fear that are the constant realities for animals in circuses. As passersby stopped to look at PETA’s elephant, with tears streaming from her eyes and a shackle around her leg, they couldn’t help but reflect on the miserable life of real elephants in circuses. Some even laid flowers at her feet.

Please do your part and refuse to support cruelty to animals by attending only animal-free circuses.

August 28 Update:

Nearly completed sad elephant, minus the shackle.

Approved design.

View the court's decision.

The court again ruled in PETA’s favor, denying the Arts Commission’s request to reconsider his previous ruling. Judge Leon also denied the commission’s request to put the ruling on hold until it can appeal his ruling, noting that the “Party Animals display is almost at an end and further delay will probably place in jeopardy PETA’s right to participate at all in the exhibit.”

“This is a victory both for the First Amendment and for animals in circuses, who live every day in pain and fear,” says PETA’s legal counsel, Matthew Penzer. “It is only by exercising our right to expose and bring awareness to issues of animal suffering that we can end them.”

With this ruling, PETA now expects to have Ella on display within a matter of days and will post a notice on this page as soon as that happens.

August 26:
After Judge Leon’s August 7 ruling that the Arts Commission had violated PETA’s First Amendment rights and his ordering it to display the elephant in a prominent location, PETA received and painted its elephant.

However, the commission has undertaken a last-ditch effort to prevent the unveiling of PETA’s elephant by filing a motion for reconsideration, asking the judge to change his mind about his earlier ruling. The commission is also asking the judge to put that ruling on hold in order to prevent PETA’s elephant from being displayed until he or an appellate court rules on the new request.

PETA, represented by the ACLU, will be in court on Tuesday, August 27, 2002, to continue to fight for our First Amendment right to expose the pain and fear inflicted upon elephants in circuses.

August 7:
After filing the lawsuit, a hearing was held on June 25. At that hearing, the D.C. Commission on the Arts claimed, for the first time, to be concerned about some of the physical aspects of the “sad” elephant design we had submitted. To address these concerns, PETA removed the tacks and blood from the design and added some decorative aspects, while still remaining true to the underlying theme that elephants in circuses suffer miserably. PETA’s attorneys submitted the revised design to the Commission, but PETA was again denied participation in the Party Animals exhibit. PETA returned to court on July 17 for a final hearing to resolve the motion for an injunction.

On August 7, Judge Richard J. Leon, of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia, granted the injunction and ordered the Commission to include PETA’s entry in the Party Animals exhibit.

“Life is no party for animals forced to perform in circuses,” says Matthew Penzer, PETA’s legal counsel. “With the court’s ruling, elephants’ cries for justice were heard—and will now be displayed—in Washington.”

The saga of PETA’s sad circus elephant, Ella PhantzPeril—a shackled baby elephant with tears trickling down her face, carrying the inscription, “The Circus Is Coming; See Shackles, Bullhooks, Loneliness … All Under the Big Top”—has ended in a victory that will allow us to expose thousands of people to the plight of elephants abused in circuses. Ella—has finally taken her rightful place, on display in a prominent location, in the “Party Animals” exhibit in the nation’s capital.It all started last year, when the commission announced plans to sponsor a public art project, called "Party Animals," in Washington, D.C.—the capital’s answer to the cow parades that have appeared in Houston, Kansas City, Chicago, and New York and Seattle’s Pigs on Parade. D.C.’s "Party Animals" project is to feature hundreds of fiberglass elephants and donkeys displayed around the district, beginning in spring and ending with an auction of the figures at the "Raucous Caucus Auction" in the fall.We were eager to participate in the public project and decided to pick our own artist, design, and location. We enlisted help from The New Yorker’s award-winning artist, Harry Bliss, who designed our "unhappy elephant"—complete with all the cruel circus trimmings, including a leg shackle, a bullhook—and a tear running down his cheek. Our elephant represents the miserable, deprived, and broken animals used in circuses, many of whom are captured from their native lands by force, separated from their families and all that is natural and pleasurable for them. They’re forced to perform uncomfortable, confusing, and often painful acts over and over again under the threat of thrashings with a bullhook. (Click here to learn more about what happens to animals in circuses.) Our recently released undercover footage of Carson & Barnes elephant trainer Tim Frisco (who learned his tricks from his father, a former Ringling trainer) screaming and swearing at elephants and beating and shocking them until they scream is appalling. But such abuses are routine in the circus world—click here and see for yourself. We filled out the necessary paperwork, and the Commission’s project manager confirmed that we were signed up as a sponsor. To our shock and dismay, we were later informed that the Commission had rejected the design Mr. Bliss created for us because the Commission doesn’t want any entries that carry messages "at all"—despite the fact that some of the other entries include patriotic messages, while others poke fun at both former vice president Dan Quayle and the infamous butterfly ballot used in Florida for the 2000 presidential election. So we submitted two more designs, one featuring a sad circus elephant and another depicting a happy circus elephant—and the Commission rejected the sad elephant but approved the happy one! We tried one last time to come up with something that would work, but again, the design was rejected.

2nd design (sad)	2nd design (happy)	Final design

How can the public draw its own conclusions about the use of animals in circuses when a piece of art in a public display is censored merely because it depicts the reality of animals suffering for the sake of entertainment? The ACLU is taking the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities to court, on PETA’s behalf, to defend our First Amendment right to tell it like it is for elephants. Click here to read the petition.