Home > A Second Look at the Sacred Cow: Cultural Chauvinism Engenders Civil Rights Deprivations

A First Amendment Case of Freedom of Speech, Freedom of Religious Expression, Freedom of Assembly

We are challenging the Village of Angelica’s Farm Animal Ordinance, which is being used to prevent our family from keeping cows for religious purposes. The Village allows a beef cow and dairy goat farm to operate next door to our home, but they will not grant us an exemption to keep our cows on our property to facilitate our goal of educating the public about the reasons why the cow and bull are considered sacred by followers of Hindu Sanatan Dharma. Western Society has been blinded by centuries of cultural bias regarding India’s reverence for cows. In common usage, ‘Sacred Cow’ is a derogatory term, used to denote anything irrationally held in esteem against a person/organizations self interest. Our aim is to directly challenge this misconception by showing the vast benefits gained by the practice of protecting cows; balanced against the destruction and harm which is caused to human society when engaged in the practice of cow killing. Our cows are not ‘farm animals.’ They are tools- ambassadors- for preaching against the exploitation and slaughter routinely experienced by ‘farm animals.’ Thus we need the cows to reside on our property in order to invite public interaction with these sentient creatures.

Farm Animal Ordinance Used in a Discriminatory Way Against Religious Practices
We wish to keep our family milk cow and her calves on our property and use oxen to pull a cart in order to show the value of the male offspring. These practices do not pose any harm to a village that allows members of the Amish community to regularly ride through town in horse drawn carriages; and allows a beef farm to operate within Village limits. Village officials have used one excuse after another to prevent our religious practices. First they said that we needed all of our neighbors consent to harbor the animals. When we hired a lawyer to show that this requirement was an un-Constitutional delegation of the Boards decision-making power, the issue was switched to one of health and safety. Although there were no health or safety violations, the Village Board reasoned that because we do not posses more than 10 acres of land, the animals might become hungry and breakout of their confines. A few villagers demonized our gentle animals as dangerous predators of dogs and grandchildren. (Hello, cows eat lawns!) We even rented 12.5 acres on which to supplement grazing of our offenseless Cows but the Village was undaunted and maliciously prosecuted criminal charges and pursued a civil lawsuit for a mandatory injunction to force the removal of our beloved family members, our Sacred Cows.

Local Judges Refuse to Recognize the First Amendment Issues
Our cases have been brought before three Village Justices, a County Court Judge and a New York State Supreme Court Judge and all of them have refused to take our First Amendment claims seriously. The Village Justice pretended that Village Court is not the place to raise First Amendment issues. On appeal, the County Court Judge displaced our claims by merely stating, “The Village Ordinances do not restrict the establishment of the Krishna Consciousness Movement or defendants practice thereof. It does not abridge his freedom of speech or his right of assembly. His right of religious expression is subject to reasonable time, place, and manner. A residential neighborhood is not the place to harbor farm animals…’ To support this opinion, the Count Court cited the now famous Supreme Court case, Employment Division vs. Smith, 494 US 872. Yet somehow, the County Court missed the essential message of the Smith case, wherein the US Supreme Court described the instances when religious hardship should be given preference.

“The only decisions in which we have held that the First Amendment bars application of a neutral, generally applicable law to religiously motivated action have involved not the Free Exercise Clause alone, but the Free Exercise Clause in conjunction with other constitutional protections, such as freedom of speech and of the press.” Ibid

”Where the State has in place a system of individual exemptions, it may not refuse to extend that system to cases of religious hardship without compelling reason.” Ibid

Our case fits within the limits of the Smith case guidelines; it deals with the freedoms of religion, speech and assembly. The Village Ordinance has a system of individual exemptions found in its permitting process, and in the other exemptions in the law that allow the beef farm to operate across the street, in a ‘residential neighborhood.’

Organized attempt by Government Officials and Private Citizens to Stop the Spread of Vedic Culture
We believe that Village of Angelica Officials have worked with private citizens to prevent our religious practices of keeping cows and working oxen, because they do not want an assembly of persons interested in cow protection to reside in ‘their’ town. Certain Citizens of Angelica, (or their relatives) recklessly drove their vehicles in a menacing manner at our family and animals and then called the police complaining that we were blocking traffic. It is our opinion that this was their combined attempt to create a ‘compelling governmental interest’ justifying the Village’s use of the Farm Animal Ordinance as a ‘Sacred Cow Ban.’ Due to this and other types of harassment, we routinely carried a video camera to document our activities. A Village Justice issued a restraining order to stop the videotaping. On September 11, 2001 we held a prayer vigil for the victims of the attack on the World Trade Center. This consisted of a Padayatra ceremony (a quiet chanting ceremony which included our animals), on a quiet back road in the village. Our daughter and her calf were nearly hit by a man in a pick up truck driving at a high rate of speed. When we complained about this to the Mayor, he retorted, “Your animals don’t belong on the street.” In the Courtroom we were shocked when the Village used the very persons who had committed these types of hate crimes against our family, as witnesses to testify against us and our cows. Our complaints about these incidents were discussed widely in the local news media, yet the State Supreme Court Judge would not let our attorney question these persons regarding their religiously biased motivation.

Deprivation of Due Process at Civil Trial
The Village sued us in State Supreme Court for a mandatory injunction to force us to move our cows, because they claimed we were harboring them illegally. The Judge did not allow us to finish testifying in our defense before granting the Village the injunction. The Judge found our practices to be, “not considerably different than the Amish driving their horses through the Village of Angelica,” and he found that there was no nuisance, yet he granted the injunction anyway. The Judge did not even address our counter suit against the Village for denial of federally guaranteed rights to possess property, contract, and practice our religion. We were not allowed to mention the word religion under threat of sanctions from the Court.

Sacred Cows are Demonized in a Land where Dogs have Rights, and Cows are Dinner
All of our First Amendment claims have been swept under the carpet and smeared as merely health and safety issues that the government is free to regulate. In the government’s effort to stop our religious practice of keeping cows, our animals have been compared to the worst, which the modern exploitative agriculture system has created; smelly factory farms that are a hell for the animals and for the people nearby. It does not seem to matter that we keep our cows and their barn environment as clean as that of any companion animals; nor that we are doing this to specifically to show that cows and other farm animals should not be kept in smelly, overcrowded conditions, which cause diseases and the dulling of man’s finer sentiments by desensitizing him to other creatures’ suffering. We are doing something that is beneficial for society, by showing that man can live in harmony with the earth and with our fellow creatures. We are trying to give practical shape to the Vedic viewpoint which states that one should not encroach upon the quota of other life forms by untimely killing them. The practice of labeling one species of animal as ‘man’s best friend’ and therefore deserving of protection of laws, while labeling another species ‘dinner’ and subjecting it to horrible cruelties, is a culturally biased viewpoint. In some cultures dogs are eaten for dinner; Americans are horrified by this ‘cruel practice.’ Similarly, in India, people are appalled by the western practice of eating cows. Indian culture revolves around utilization of the cow’s milk and the ox for transport, and it is understood that by protecting them, even in their old age, one gets good fortune and develops noble qualities of gratitude and compassion.

Blinded by Cultural Chauvinism
The pernicious propaganda that derides India’s reverence for the cows and bullocks, which provide for her populace, should be reexamined in light of America’s appreciation of dogs and cats. A recent tragedy is a case in point. A police officer lost his partner, a dog, in an automobile accident. The officer was devastated, saying that he thought of the dog as his son. A public funeral was held, with police officers attending from around the state. As a police dog, this animal held great social value. Most Americans who own dogs could empathize with the officer’s grief, for they also think of thier animals as part of the family. Laws have been created to protect these animals, and the penalties for animal cruelty cases is getting very stiff, because social scientists are recognizing that disregard for the suffering of other living entities has an escalating affect wherein violence to animals leads to violence to human beings. These are commonly accepted ideas. But if we try to say that cows and other animals should be included in the list of protected, companion animals, and doing so right next to a beef farm, we are told that the First Amendment is not applicable to us because, ‘cows and goats are simply not the same as household pets.’ This amounts to nothing more than Cultural Chauvinism.