Happy The Elephant Denied Personhood

This week, the New York Court of Appeals rejected a bid for writ of habeas corpus from an unusual petitioner: Happy, a 51-year-old, female Asian elephant, currently living in captivity at the Bronx Zoo.

In its 5-2 opinion, the court held that habeas corpus only protects against the unlawful and indefinite imprisonment of human beings, and that Petitioner, the Nonhuman Rights Project, could not use the legal mechanism to bust Happy out of the zoo and into an elephant sanctuary.

Though the outcome of the case was not particularly surprising, it did feature some surprising elements—the first of which was the court's willingness to hear the case at all.

Because the New York Court of Appeals only grants certiorari to a fraction of the cases that petition to be heard, the judges' agreement to hear Happy's case was notable. Also notable were the two separate, passionate dissents issued by Judges Wilson and Riviera. Judge Wilson invoked the history of habeas, pointing