A History of Animal Law Accomplishments
Barbara J. Gislason Honored with ABA Animal Law Award
Barbara J. Gislason, a tireless advocate for animal welfare, was awarded the prestigious 2024 Excellence in the Advancement of Animal Law Award by the American Bar Association’s Animal Law Committee in Hollywood. This honor recognizes Gislason’s exceptional commitment and leadership in promoting the humane treatment of animals through legal channels. Her groundbreaking work has advanced animal rights and interests, shaped policies, and inspired lawyers and judges to recognize that Animal Law is an important and worthy practice area. Gislason’s remarkable achievements in helping to establish Animal Law as a practice area, which attracted some of the best and brightest lawyers from across the U.S. and beyond, solidified her as a trailblazer in the field of Animal Law.
Barbara Speaks at Harvard, in India, and at National Venues
In 2006, Barbara J. Gislason spoke at the Humane Society of the United States on Animals in Disaster at a national conference, the Virginia Animal Control Association Conference, the Michigan Animal Law Symposium co-sponsored by the State Bar and Veterinary Medical Association, the Minnesota Animal Law Section Annual Conference, and the Lewis & Clark Animal Law Conference.
In 2007, she spoke at a variety of venues, including the Keoladeo National Park at an Anniversary of the “Crane Court” in Bharatpur, India, the Animal Legal Defense Fund (ALDF) Harvard University Law School Animal Law Conference, and the American Veterinary Medical Law Association (AVMLA) Annual Meeting.
In 2013, Barbara spoke at Columbia Law School at the request of two student organizations on Animal Law, science, and technology. She also spoke at the American Bar Association Section of Family Law Spring Conference in Anchorage, Alaska regarding The Modern Family: Who Let the Dogs In? In addition, she participated in an American Bar Association dangerous dog webinar called Defending Clients in Dangerous Dog Proceedings. She continues to be in demand as a speaker, with recent speeches at a seminar in Serbia and for an Animal Law seminar for Minnesota CLE.
First Animal Law Course Offered in Minnesota
In January 2004, Barbara co-taught the first Animal Law course offered at a Minnesota law school. Barbara then founded the Minnesota Common Law Project in Animal Law, and in cooperation with the Minnesota Justice Foundation, she recruited students from three law schools who, under Barbara’s guidance, qualitatively interviewed 38 judges and referees in six counties. As Animal Law was then in its infancy, the information collected was used to gain insight into the courts’ current knowledge and understanding of this practice area, to gather courtroom stories and experiences, and to consider how courts are bridging the gaps between codified law and case law in a rapidly changing field. Today, her firm serves clients statewide, including in Anoka County, Hennepin County, and Ramsey County.
Animal Law at the American Bar Association
On October 9, 2004, Barbara brought Animal Law to the American Bar Association (ABA). By unanimous vote, the Council for the ABA’s prestigious Tort Trial & Insurance Practice Section (TIPS) made Animal Law a Committee and Barbara its first Chair. This was the only Animal Law Committee in the ABA at the time, and its scope was broad, ranging from equine, family, endangered species, and criminal law, to contracts, torts, insurance law, and more recently, biotechnology and emergency management.
The mission statement for the committee, which Barbara authored, was: “To evolve our thinking on animal issues for both the United States and the world. By attracting the best and brightest lawyers in this country, with a wide variety of perspectives, we will look at animal-related problems and issues today, and think about new ways to define, manage, and solve them. Utilizing problem-solving strategies, we will also look at the law as it exists today—fragmented around the country—and envision what it could be. The ABA-TIPS Animal Law Committee will be the instrument of a paradigm shift and will bring to the table and address legitimate business and economic interests, and humane concerns.” Indeed, TIPS has long been one of the most respected and award-winning committees in the ABA.
Barbara recruited extraordinary leaders from around the world to fulfill the Committee’s ambitious goals. Those who joined the Committee as early leaders included Kristina Hancock (Tax lawyer in San Diego, California), Patrick Costello (Agricultural Lawyer in Jackson, Minnesota), Julie Fershtman (Equine Lawyer in Farmington Hills, Michigan), David Favre (Animal and Environmental Law Professor at Michigan State Law School in Detroit, Michigan), Jill Mariani (White Collar Crime Prosecutor in New York, New York), Joan Schaffner (Associate Professor of Law and Director of the Animal Law program at George Washington University Law School in Washington, D.C.), Benjamin Zvenia (Tribal Judge in Las Vegas, Nevada), Raj Panjwani (Animal and Environment Legal Defense Fund in Delhi, India), Warren Woessner (Patent attorney in Minneapolis, Minnesota), Adam Karp (Plaintiff attorney in Bellingham, Washington), Song Wei (Professor of the University of Science and Technology in Beijing, China), and Paul Waldau (Professor at Harvard University, Boston, Massachusetts).
While Barbara served as Chair for two years, the Committee received two of the coveted TIPS Innovation Awards. Barbara chaired and spoke at the Committee’s first continuing legal education program at the ABA Annual Meeting called It’s a Dog’s Life: What Does Tort and Insurance Law Have to Say About It? She served for two years as the Editor-in-Chief of the Animal Law Committee Newsletter, which she also created, and she published articles in ABA TIPS’ The Brief, Tort Source, and Tort Trial & Insurance Practice Law Journal.
When Hurricane Katrina devastated the gulf coast in the fall of 2005, Barbara expanded her ABA efforts. She created and directed the ABA-TIPS Animal Disaster Relief Network, which included participants from more than 70 nonprofits, law schools, and businesses. In this capacity, she wrote regularly published reports, including the first comprehensive overview in the country of state laws pertaining to animals and veterinarians in the homeland security, emergency management, and good samaritan context. She created and convened the ABA-TIPS Select Legal Panel on Emergency Management Regarding Animals, which fast-tracked model language on model hold periods, or the amount of time animals must be kept before title could be legally transferred.
Others serving on this Committee included Stephanie Ostrowski (Epidemiologist for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention), Sarah Babcock (veterinarian and lawyer for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security), Kevin Dennison (veterinarian), Melissa Rubin (Vice President of the Field and Emergency Services of the Humane Society of the United States), David Favre (Professor at Michigan State University Law School, and Ledy VanKavage (Best Friends Animal Society).
Barbara also worked closely with Committee Vice Chairs Kristina Hancock of California and Assistant Attorney General Jim Carr of Colorado, to secure the TIPS’ sponsorship of the Federal Pets Evacuation and Transportation Standards (PETS) Act. This led to the entire ABA supporting the congressional passage of the PETS Act, which was subsequently passed by Congress.
Barbara was appointed as the ABA-TIPS Advisor to the National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws (NCCUSL), now called the Uniform Law Commission (ULC), regarding the Uniform Emergency Volunteer Health Practitioners Act (UEVHPA). There, she was influential in having veterinarians included in the Act and contributed to the model language concerning them.
Union Internationale des Avocats (UIA)
In 2011, Barbara J. Gislason made a presentation on the main stage at the 55th Congress of the Paris-based Union Internationale des Avocats (UIA). Her speech was entitled Human Hybrids and Chimeras: Exploring the Implications of Biobanks and Pluripotent Cells Regarding Species Integrity and National Security. Following her presentation, she was recruited to serve as President of the UIA’s Biotechnology Law Commission.
At this prestigious organization, founded in 1927 and with members from 110 countries, she advanced to President of the U.S. National Committee, and then to Editor-in -Chief of the UIA’s flagship publication, the Juriste International, while serving on the UIA’s Board of Governors and Executive Committee. Her influential role in the UIA, including her part in publishing the first ever Animal Law focused issue in a European-based law publication, enabled her to set the stage and hand pick Yolanda Eisenstein, a former chair of the TIPS ABA Animal Law Committee, and recruit UIA members to serve, for the first UIA Animal Law Commission.