It’s walking horse time in Tennessee. Again.
And once again, we have hopes of bipartisan legislation that promises to end – finally – the inhumane practice of horse soring, which became illegal in 1970 but persists due to loopholes in the current law.
This legislation – known as the PAST Act originally introduced seven years ago in 2013 – has always had phenomenal support. This year it has 345 co-sponsors across both chambers of Congress, yet its passage in the House on Thursday marked its first-ever vote, and the bill’s supporters fear it faces continuing opposition in the Senate. More on this later.
Controversy and cruelty are not new in the Tennessee walking horse world. Here we are nearly 50 years after the first of many scandals and early legislation to clean up the industry were supposed to return Tennessee walking horse time in the Volunteer State to its humble tradition and beauty. The 1970 Horse Protection Act outlawed soring – the practice of applying irritants, blistering agents or painful shoeing to the front feet or forelegs of a horse. Soring makes a horse pick its feet up higher in an exaggerated manner that is now called “the big lick.” Soring shortcuts training time and gives trainers and owners an unfair advantage over competitors.
The trouble with the Horse Protection Act was that it was never completely enforced. Overseen by the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, a branch of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, it has always lacked funding and there were never enough inspectors. In 1976, the law was amended to allow non-USDA employees to be trained and certified as inspectors. Thus the walking horse industry came to police itself. If you’re thinking this sounds like an invitation to the fox to guard the hen house, you are correct.