Wash. Times Editorial Urges Senators to Side with Their Public

Save the horses
Most Americans would sooner starve than eat fillet of horse with cranberry chutney, or however they do it in Europe. It might then come as a surprise that 66,000 horses were slaughtered for consumption in the United States last year, and 20,000 more were exported abroad for the same purposes. Even more so when one considers that nearly none of this horse flesh ends up on American platters -- and for that we are thankful.
While cattle and poultry are bred specifically for food, horses are not. Many of those sold to slaughterhouses are privately owned or caught in the wild by the federal Bureau of Land Management, which then tries to find adoptive homes. When it cannot, the horses go to the highest bidder, in this case either to one of the three Belgian- or French- owned plants.
Fortunately, there is growing opposition in Congress to this kind of thing. In June, the House passed by a bipartisan majority an amendment to the agriculture appropriations bill banning the use of federal funds in the slaughtering of horses. The Senate is schedule to vote on the amendment, sponsored by veterinarian Sen. John Ensign, next week. We encourage senators to support this ban...[READ MORE]