Gary L. Francione is Professor of Law and Nicholas de B. Katzenbach Scholar of Law at Rutgers University Law School, Newark. He is also Co-director of the Rutgers Animal Rights Law Center.

"Gary Francione's important contribution to the history of ideas places animal exploitation in its legal, philosophical, and economic context. A thorough, scholarly, and much-needed analysis that should be considered seriously even by those who disagree with the notion of animal rights." -William A. J. Watson, University of Georgia

• Foreword – William M. Kunstler, Esq. Preface and Acknowledgments Introduction: Legal Welfarism: The Consequences of the Property Status of AnimalsPart I: The Status of Animals as Property 1. The Problem: "Unnecessary" Suffering and the "Humane" Treatment of Property 2. The Dominion of Humans over Animals, the "Defects" of Animals, and the Common Law 3. Two Examples of Legal Welfarism 4. The Exclusion of Animal Interests from Legal Consideration-the Doctrine of Standing 5. Laws and Rights: Claims, Benefits, Interests, and the Instrumental Status of Animals Part I ConclusionPart II: A General Application of the Theory: Anticruelty Statutes 6. The Purposes of Anticruelty Statutes 7. Anticruelty Statutes and the Protection of the Institutionalized Exploitation of Animals Part II ConclusionPart III: A Specific Application of the Theory: The Regulation of Animal Experimentation 8. Animal Experimentation: Animal Property and Human "Benefit" 9. The Federal Animal Welfare Act 10. The Administrative Regulation of the Animal Welfare Act 11. The Animal Welfare Act in the Courts Part III ConclusionEpilogue: An Alternative to Legal Welfarism? Explanation of Legal Citations Notes Selected Bibliography Index