Order Code RS22493
Updated March 15, 2007
The Animal Welfare Act:
Background and Selected Legislation
Geoffrey S. Becker
Specialist in Agricultural Policy
Resources, Science, and Industry Division
Summary
The Animal Welfare Act was first passed in 1966 to prevent pets from being stolen
and sold to research laboratories, and to improve the treatment and well-being of
animals intended for research. Congress has amended the act five times since then to
strengthen its provisions, expand coverage to more animals and activities, and curtail
animal fighting, among other things. Some animal protection groups support measures
to further expand federal regulation of animal treatment. Bills proposed in the 109th
Congress included those addressing animal fighting, dog and cat protection, and pet
evacuation in disasters, among others. Several proposals have reemerged in the 110th
Congress, including H.R. 137/S. 261; and H.R. 1280/S. 714.
The Animal Welfare Act (AWA; 7 U.S.C. 2131 et seq.) is intended to ensure the
humane treatment of animals that are intended for research, bred for commercial sale,
exhibited to the public, or commercially transported. Under the AWA, businesses and
others with animals covered by the law must be licensed or registered, and they must
adhere to minimum standards of care. Farm animals are among those not covered by the
act, which nonetheless provides a broad set of statutory protections for animals.1
The law was first passed in 1966 following several years of lobbying by animal
welfare organizations and growing public outcry over allegations that large numbers of
pets were being “dognapped” for sale to medical research laboratories. Congress
amended the original law in 1970, 1976, 1985, 1990, and 2002. These amendments
generally were intended to expand the scope of the AWA or to clarify various provisions.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA’s) Animal and Plant Health Inspection
Service (APHIS) administers the AWA. The House and Senate Agriculture Committees
have exercised primary legislative jurisdiction over the act and its amendments.
1 Numerous other federal laws seek to protect other classes of animals, often those from the wild.
Examples include the Marine Mammal Protection Act, the Lacey Act as amended, and the Wild
Free-Roaming Horses and Burros Act. These and the others are described, with legal citations,
in CRS Report 94-731, Brief Summaries of Federal Animal Protection Statutes, by Henry Cohen.

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Key Provisions2
Animals Covered. The act applies to any live or dead dog, cat, nonhuman
primate, guinea pig, hamster, rabbit, or other warmblooded animal determined by the
Secretary of Agriculture to be for research or exhibition, or used as a pet. The AWA
explicitly excludes birds, rats, and mice bred for research; horses not used for research;
and other farm animals used in the production of food and fiber.3 Animals sold in retail
facilities are not covered, unless they are wild or exotic animals. Cold-blooded animals
like fish and reptiles also are excluded from coverage.
Businesses and Activities Covered. Generally, animal dealers and exhibitors
must obtain a license, for which an annual fee is charged. APHIS does not issue a license
until it inspects the facility and finds it to be in full compliance with its regulations. If a
facility loses its license, it cannot continue its regulated activity. Those who conduct
research, and general carriers that transport regulated animals, do not need a license but
must still register with APHIS and undergo periodic inspections. Specific details follow.
Dealers, including pet and laboratory animal breeders and brokers, auction operators,
and anyone who sells exotic or wild animals, or dead animals or their parts, must have an
APHIS license for that activity. So-called Class A licensees are breeders who deal only
in animals they breed and raise; all others are called Class B licensees. Exempt from the
law and regulations are retail pet stores, those who sell pets directly to pet owners, hobby
breeders, animal shelters, and boarding kennels.
Exhibitors must be licensed by APHIS as such. These so-called Class C licensees
include zoos, marine mammal shows, circuses, carnivals, and promotional and
educational exhibits. The law and regulations exempt agricultural shows and fairs, horse
shows, rodeos, pet shows, game preserves, hunting events, and private collectors who do
not exhibit, among others.
Animal transporters must be registered, including general carriers (e.g., airlines,
railroads, and truckers). Businesses that contract to transport animals for compensation
are considered dealers and must have licenses.
Research facilities must be registered. They include state and local government-run
research institutions, drug firms, universities, diagnostic laboratories, and facilities that
study marine mammals. Federal facilities, elementary and secondary schools, and
agricultural research institutions are among those exempt from registration.
Animal fighting generally is prohibited by the AWA. The ban includes dogfights
and bear and raccoon baiting; sponsors and exhibitors are subject to penalties. The AWA
also bans bird fights, except in the states where they are not prohibited by state law
(namely Louisiana and New Mexico), and the sponsor or exhibitor was unaware that the
transaction had occurred in interstate commerce.

2 Unless noted, sources on the AWA are various materials provided by APHIS.
3 For example, rabbits raised for food are exempt from AWA coverage; those for pets are not.

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Standards. All licensed and registered entities must comply with USDA-APHIS
regulations, including recordkeeping and published standards of care. These standards
deal with humane handling, shelter, space requirements, feeding, watering, sanitation,
ventilation, veterinary care, and transport. (AWA regulations are at 9 C.F.R. §1.1 et seq.)
Oversight and Enforcement
APHIS’s Animal Care (AC) program oversees the AWA, under which more than
10,000 facilities were licensed or registered in FY2006. That year, AC had total staff of
more than 180 and an annual budget of $17.8 million.4
Animal Care officials make unannounced inspections of registered and licensed
facilities to ensure compliance with all rules. Under the AWA, research facilities are to
be inspected at least annually. Inspection frequency for other AWA-regulated facilities
is based on risk; for example, moderate-risk facilities are to be visited about once yearly.
APHIS inspectors also conduct searches to identify unlicensed or unregistered facilities.
Failure to correct deficiencies can result in confiscation of animals, fines, cease-and-desist
orders, or license suspensions. AC inspectors conducted 18,600 inspections during
FY2006, which included pre-licensing as well as compliance inspections, according to
APHIS. About 70% of all facilities have been in “complete compliance” with AWA
requirements at the time of their most recent inspection, according to past USDA budget
documents.
Legislative History
Original Law. Although long known as the Animal Welfare Act, the original law
was passed simply as P.L. 89-544, the Act of August 24, 1966. The law requires dealers
in dogs and cats for research purposes to obtain a USDA license and to abide by USDA-
set humane treatment requirements. It also requires a research facility to register with
USDA only if it uses dogs or cats and either (1) purchases them in interstate commerce
or (2) receives federal research money. The law authorizes the Secretary of Agriculture
to set humane handling standards for guinea pigs, nonhuman primates, rabbits and
hamsters as well as dogs and cats — but only dealers and research facilities with dogs and
cats are subject to these standards. Farmers and pet owners are among those exempted
from the law. Other provisions spell out recordkeeping requirements, enforcement
authorities and penalties for noncompliance.
Animal Welfare Act of 1970. P.L. 91-579 expands animal coverage to include
all warm-blooded animals determined by the Secretary to be used for experimentation or
exhibition, except horses not used in research and farm animals used in food and fiber
research. The 1970 law also incorporates exhibitors; defines research facilities; and
exempts from coverage retail pet stores, agricultural fairs, rodeos, dog and cat shows.
Animal Welfare Act Amendments of 1976. P.L. 94-279 was passed mainly
to clarify and expand previous regulations covering animal transport and commerce. This
4 A portion of this amount, nearly $500,000, was used to administer the Horse Protection Act (15
U.S.C. §§1821-1831), which makes it a crime to exhibit or transport any “sore” horse, i.e. one
whose feet have been injured to alter its gait.

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act for the first time addresses animal fighting, making it illegal to exhibit or transport
interstate animals used in fighting ventures, such as dogs and roosters. Hunting animals
are generally exempt, as are live fighting birds for states where such fighting is legal.
Improved Standards for Laboratory Animals Act. These amendments were
passed as Title XVII, Subtitle F of the Food Security Act of 1985 (P.L. 99-198, the
omnibus 1985 farm bill). The law directs the Secretary to set new minimum standards
of care for handling, housing, feeding, water, sanitation, ventilation, and so forth. One
new provision that was highly contentious at the time singles out two species by requiring
standards for the exercise of dogs and the psychological well-being of primates. The law
provides that research facilities must have procedures that minimize pain and stress to the
animals, and describes practices considered to be painful. Each research facility must
establish an Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee to review research proposals
that involve animal experimentation and to provide oversight of laboratories. The
amendments also increase civil and criminal penalties for AWA violations, and establish
an animal welfare information center at USDA’s National Agricultural Library.
Protection of Pets. Section 2503 of the Food Agriculture, Conservation, and
Trade Act of 1990 (P.L. 101-624, the 1990 farm bill) extends pet protections. It requires
public and private animal shelters and research facilities which acquire dogs and cats to
hold them for at least five days to allow time for either adoption or recovery by the
original owner before they can be sold to a dealer. Dealers are prohibited from selling
dogs and cats they did not breed unless they provide certified records on, among other
things, the animals’ origin. Other new recordkeeping requirements also are specified.
2002 Amendments. Title X, Subtitle D of the Farm Security and Rural
Investment Act of 2002 (P.L. 107-171, the omnibus 2002 farm bill) makes it a
misdemeanor to ship a bird in interstate commerce for fighting purposes, or to sponsor or
exhibit any bird in a fight with knowledge that any of the birds were so shipped (even
fights within a state where the practice is permitted). The law also increases the
maximum financial penalty for violations of the anti-fighting provisions of the AWA.
The 2002 law also explicitly excludes from AWA coverage birds, rats, and mice bred for
research purposes. The Secretary of Agriculture had previously published regulations
excluding these animals from coverage, which the Animal Legal Defense Fund challenged
in federal court. When USDA agreed to settle the case by essentially reversing its
regulations, Congress (in P.L. 106-387, the FY2001 agriculture appropriation) blocked
the action by prohibiting funds for such a rule change. The 2002 law made the exclusion
a permanent part of the AWA.5
Selected Bills in the 110th Congress
Congress has been asked to consider a variety of bills in recent decades which seek
to improve the welfare of animals. Generally, those proposing to amend the AWA have
been referred to the House and Senate Agriculture Committees.
Animal Fighting Prohibition Enforcement Act. Companion bills (H.R. 137
by Representative Gallegly and S. 261 by Senator Cantwell) would move the animal
5 Brief Summaries of Federal Animal Protection Statutes, by Henry Cohen.

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fighting provisions of the AWA to Title 18 of the U.S. Code (Crimes and Criminal
Procedure), make violations of federal animal fighting law a felony punishable by up to
two years in prison, and prohibit interstate and foreign commerce in knives and gaffs
designed for use in cockfighting. On February 6, 2007, H.R. 137 was reported favorably
by the House Judiciary Committee (after a subcommittee hearing and markup on the same
day) and referred to the House Agriculture Committee. S. 261 was pending in the Senate
Judiciary Committee in mid-March 2007. (These bills had been introduced into the 109th
Congress as S. 382 and H.R. 817, passing the Senate but not the House.)
Proponents of the bills have asserted that in 2001, the House and Senate had
approved strong animal fighting sanctions in their respective farm bills (H.R. 2646 and
S. 1731), but that conferees on the final 2002 farm bill removed the felony language.
Stronger deterrents are needed because animal fighting is a brutal, inhumane practice that
is closely associated with criminal activity, endangers children where aggressive dogs are
being reared, and may contribute to the spread of avian influenza in the case of live birds,
they argued. Opponents have countered that the proposed measures would violate
provisions in the U.S. Constitution that protect states’ rights, including the Commerce
Clause, and that recognize private citizens’ right to travel for economic reasons.
Completely banning and/or stiffening penalties for all animal fighting activities would
drive them further underground, undermining efforts to protect animals and the public
from any disease problems created by such activities, other opponents have argued.
Pet Safety and Protection Act. Legislation (H.R. 1280 by Representative Doyle
and S. 714 by Senator Akaka) would restrict where research facilities could obtain their
dogs and cats. Such animals could be obtained only from licensed breeders, publicly
operated shelters, other licensed research facilities, or donees that had bred and raised the
animal or that had owned it for at least the previous year. Proponents have asserted that
the bills are aimed at shutting down some 15 “Class B” dealers who collect dogs and cats
from random sources, including “free to a good home” classified advertisements,
auctions, and flea markets, and who arguably are more concerned about profit than animal
welfare. Bill opponents contend that passage would leave no viable sources of random
source dogs and cats, which are needed by medical and veterinary researchers because of
their genetic and age diversity. Opponents add that the majority of Class B dealers are in
compliance with the AWA. The bills (which were introduced in the 109th Congress as
H.R. 5229 and S. 451) were referred to the House and Senate Agriculture Committees.
Agriculture-Related Measures in the 110th Congress. Various agricultural-
related animal protection measures also have been introduced. For example, S. 394 and
H.R. 661 would amend the Humane Methods of Slaughter Act (7 U.S.C. 1901 et seq.) to
require that all nonambulatory livestock (called “downers” by the trade) be humanely
euthanized and not enter the food supply. H.R. 503 and S. 311 would amend the Horse
Protection Act (15 U.S.C. §1821 et seq.) to prohibit the movement and slaughter of horses
for food. In some recent years, USDA appropriations measures have included language
and/or funding to address aspects of animal welfare. For background on these and related
measures, see CRS Report RS21978, Humane Treatment of Farm Animals: Overview and
Issues; and CRS Report RS21842, Horse Slaughter Prevention Bills and Issues.

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Selected Bills in the 109th Congress
PETS Act. Past legislation has addressed other animal welfare concerns, often
outside the confines of the AWA. For example, the House on May 22, 2006, passed the
so-called Pets Evacuation and Transportation Standards (PETS) Act (H.R. 3858 by
Representative Lantos). The bill was to amend the Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and
Emergency Assistance Act (at 42 U.S.C. 5196b) to require the Federal Emergency
Management Agency to ensure that state and local agencies address the needs of
household pet owners and service animals in their disaster response plans. A similar but
somewhat broader bill (S. 2548 by Senator Stevens) was offered in the Senate. H.R. 5441
(passed in Senate) and S. 3721 (reported in Senate) contained comparable provisions.
(See also CRS Report RL33579, The Public Health and Medical Response to Disasters:
Federal Authority and Funding, by Sarah A. Lister.)
Pet Animal Welfare Statute (“PAWS”). These companion bills (H.R. 2669 by
Representative Gerlach and S. 1139 by Senator Santorum) would have required
commercial dog and cat breeders to obtain AWA licenses if they sell more than six litters
or more than 25 dogs or cats directly to the public each year. The bills, which were in the
respective Agriculture Committees, also would have required more record-keeping to
ascertain the sources of the animals and would have strengthened USDA’s ability to
correct AWA violations.
Supporters of the bills contended that the Internet and other relatively recent
marketing techniques have enabled importers and large commercial breeders, whom they
call “puppy mills,” to sell their animals directly to the public while evading the AWA
licensing and humane handling requirements, even though they are selling large numbers
of animals. (Wholesale breeders are already covered by the AWA.) Opponents countered
that the measures would strain USDA resources and newly subject thousands of relatively
small in-home and hobby breeders, as well as rescue organizations, to burdensome
licensing and regulatory requirements that were designed for large commercial businesses;
some cat breeders in particular have argued that the six-litter limit is too low for their
animals and threatens efforts to preserve some breeds.

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