Signatures turned in for animal cruelty measure

The signatures needed to get a measure that would punish cruelty to animals on North Dakota’s November ballot are going to the Secretary of State’s office today, said supporters.

North Dakotans to Stop Animal Cruelty has collected more than 25,000 signatures — well over the 13,462 signatures needed for a state law ballot measure, said group member Karen Thunshelle of Minot.

According to the measure, any person who “maliciously and intentionally burns, poisons, crushes, suffocates, impales, drowns, blinds, skins, bludgeons to death, drags to death, exsanguinates, disembowels or dismembers any living dog, cat or horse” would face a Class C felony. Such felonies are punishable by up to five years in prison and a $5,000 fine.

Courts could require a psychological or psychiatric evaluation of a perpetrator and could order them not to possess a dog, cat or horse for up to five years if convicted.

The measure excludes branding or marking of an animal for identification. It expressly says it won’t affect North Dakota hunting, fishing, farming and ranching.

NDFB gathers signatures for right-to-farm measure

The North Dakota Farm Bureau has gathered more than 30,000 signatures to put a right-to-farm constitutional amendment up for a statewide vote in November.

The group needs 26,904 valid signatures.

The amendment is designed to protect “modern” practices, but anything from hot-iron branding or cattle roping that have been around for decades, and genetic modifications, according to NDFB President Doyle Johannes of Underwood. “Whatever is common to the time,” is what would be approved.

Many have asked what the threat is to agriculture that such a measure would guard against. “We’ve mentioned that there are some of these out-of-state groups coming into other states and negatively impacting — specifically — the livestock industry,” said NDFB Executive Vice President Jeffrey Missling of Fargo.

Johannes has said the successful efforts by the Humane Society of the United States to shut down veal calf operations in Arizona and other states prompted the proposed constitutional amendment here.

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Tags: news, election, measures, animals