Judge upholds Maryland ban on pet stores' sale of cats, dogs

[Judi Lynn]

Source: Associated Press


Michael Kunzelman, Associated Press
Updated 5:31 pm CST, Friday, February 7, 2020

COLLEGE PARK, Md. (AP) — A federal judge on Friday threw out a lawsuit that challenged Maryland's newly enacted ban on the sale of dogs and cats by retail pet stores, a statute billed as a check against unlicensed and unsanitary "puppy mills."

Four pet stores, a dog breeder and a dog broker sued in August to block the law, which took effect Jan. 1. Maryland was the second state after California to pass such restrictions on the sale of dogs and cats.

The law bans pet stores from selling dogs and cats but encourages them to collaborate with animal welfare groups to “showcase” dogs from shelters, animal control units and “local breeders.”

U.S. District Judge Ellen Hollander, who also denied the plaintiffs' request for a preliminary injunction blocking the law's enforcement, said she found ample evidence that state lawmakers had a "rational basis" for enacting the statute.

Read more: https://www.chron.com/news/us/article/Judge-upholds-Maryland-ban-on-pet-stores-sale-of-15039475.php

[paleotn]

1. Wonderful news!

Our 4 rescue puppers agree.

[She_Totally_Gets_It]

2. I don't understand. What's the argument for and against this? I have an issue with shelters...

Because most of them are "kill" shelters. I'm in Maryland, also.

[Jedi Guy]

3. This law seems to me like a well-meaning but poorly applied one-size-fits-all solution.

Putting a stop to puppy mills is definitely a good thing, but simply banning pet stores from selling cats and dogs comes across as a little extreme. If a pet store is clean and sanitary, and if the animals are well cared for, I don't see any problem with them selling cats and dogs. If they're not clean and/or the animals aren't being properly cared for, then shut them down. A blanket ban seems overly broad.

Or was the intent here to encourage people to adopt their critters from shelters?

[Sucha NastyWoman]

4. It's not a matter of the stores being clean

It’s that they buy from puppy mills. A responsible breeder spends a lot of money in their endeavor and so must sell the puppies for a price too high for a pet store to make money on. As a result, pet stores buy from large scale operations aka puppy mills. It’s not the pet store that has deplorable conditions. It’s the puppy mills they buy from, and thus encourage more puppy mills.

[CountAllVotes]

5. Puppy mill dogs

The sad part about dogs from puppy mills is that they are often the result of inbreeding.

An inbred dog not only has a myriad of health issues, it can also have many behavioral issues as well.

Many are not properly socialized and are raised in filthy contaminated conditions and yes, the non-stop inbreeding just creates more dogs that end up being born that are sick and live short lives because of it.

I know that kill shelters are not nice things but every animal I adopt comes from a kill shelter because I'd rather ADOPT and NOT SHOP!

Adoption saves lives and many a fine cat or dog, etc. come from kill shelters.

I love my cats, all of them. They are beautiful and alive because I adopted them.

The kill shelter that I go to has an adoption rate of 90% which is impressive IMO.

& recommend.

[Sucha NastyWoman]

6. What I don't understand is this

Fortunately, lots of people now think of going to a shelters first. Most pet owners I meet have adopted from a shelter. Yet still, all of the shelters are almost always overflowing. It seems like things should be getting better, but I don’t see any evidence of this. Are many of the adopted dogs getting returned/ abandoned? Or is it just that in the past many were being euthanized and now this is not so common?

Inbreeding is a problem in puppy mills, but many breeders who would consider themselves “responsible” do what they call line breeding. Which, in my opinion can still result in “too close” breeding as opposed to inbreeding. They might never think of breeding a father to a daughter, but they still breed dogs who share many common ancestors 2 or 3 generations back.

[Igel]

8. A lot of people get dogs or are given dogs without thinking.

Then there's a bad match between owner and pet and the critters get tossed.

Maybe there's an inconvenient move and it's easier to replace than relocate the pet.

This is like many "I want the goal whatever the cost" policy proposals where the "cost" is paid by others, so it's not really a cost the policy proposers care about. Meanwhile, it's difficult to regulate, monitor, and punish puppy mills that have bad practices. Better to through the baby out with the bathwater if it's too difficult to regulate and monitor the bathwater users. It's like building a hedge around a principle you so don't want (others) to violate that you go overboard.

It's an easy (over) generalization that all breeders run puppy mills, which are inherently evil and should be banned because they're immoral.

Getting support from some of the more extreme corners of society is easy--some people don't want (anybody) to have pets, so anything making pet-acquisition harder is a good thing.

We have 5 cats. All were strays, 3 of them were born wild and I caught when they were just weaned and tamed them (then caught their mother and had her spayed).

[CountAllVotes]

9. Spay and neuter pets

This is one reason for the crowded shelters, pets aren't being spayed and neutered.

That said, inbreeding is a huge problem everywhere with purebred dogs (some which end up being sold in pet stores).

I personally owned a discarded dog about 15 years ago. The "owner" no longer wanted the dog and she offered to send it to me for $200. So, I went for it.

The dog I adopted turned out to be the saddest dog I'd ever known.

Not only was she inbred herself, she'd been forcibly bred herself only to give birth to a litter of sick puppies that died.

I found this out after-the-fact and I did all I could to bring this "breeder" down.

No one cared nor listened but finally LAST YEAR it caught up with the breeder. I found an article in the newspaper about the breeder and they confiscated some of the dogs, but not all.

I heard there was a trial to be held and I called and offered to appear as a witness. They were not interested in my testimony and this "breeder" is still in business today.

Its all about money. Greed and money is the only thing that will bring this to an end so please ADOPT and DO NOT SHOP!

[Jedi Guy]

7. Ahhh, okay. That makes much more sense, then.

In any case, my wife and I have agreed that we'll never buy an animal from a pet store; all of our critters will come from shelters. The cat in my lap as I type this (Chairman Meow) was a stray kitten when I took him in. Fourteen years later, he's still with me, and still my best buddy.

My mother-in-law, on the other hand, just had to have a hairless Chinese crested, and spent $4000 on him. He's a sweet dog, but he's inbred (his grandfather is also his great-grandfather) and just riddled with health issues as a result. It blows my mind that she dropped so much money on an inbred dog when so many perfectly good dogs in shelters need forever homes.

[CountAllVotes]

10. +1,000+++++

I am glad to know your best friend is still around and thank you for opting to ADOPT and NOT SHOP.