The Nonhuman Rights Project is seeking to apply habeas corpus rights to animals. The group filed a lawsuit in New York in December asking “this court to issue a writ recognizing that Tommy is not a legal thing to be possessed by respondents, but rather is a cognitively complex autonomous legal person with the fundamental right not to be imprisoned.” So far the court has rejected this and other lawsuits. Give it time, though, and Tommy and his chimp friends will be recognized as persons. Then someone will say that he wants to legally marry the chimp. And the sad thing is, some libertarian chumps will think it is a good idea, a new birth of freedom or something.

The Best of Laurence M. Vance