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Conn. Court Considers Whether Elephants Deserve Human Rights

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In this file photo taken Friday, Sept. 30, 2016, an elephant walks through the bush at the Southern African Wildlife College on the edge of Kruger National Park in South Africa. The Chinese government said in a statement released on Friday Dec. 30, 2016, it will shut down its official ivory trade at the end of 2017 in a move designed to curb the mass slaughter of African elephants.(Denis Farrell/AP)
In this file photo taken Friday, Sept. 30, 2016, an elephant walks through the bush at the Southern African Wildlife College on the edge of Kruger National Park in South Africa. The Chinese government said in a statement released on Friday Dec. 30, 2016, it will shut down its official ivory trade at the end of 2017 in a move designed to curb the mass slaughter of African elephants.(Denis Farrell/AP)

In Connecticut, an appeals court will hear arguments on Monday in a case about the rights of elephants.

A nonprofit called the Nonhuman Rights Project has said that three elephants at the Commerford Petting Zoo are being held in deplorable conditions. The group wants to free the elephants and is taking an unorthodox approach. It's trying to get the court to recognize the animals' "personhood," a status that would entitle them to the same legal protections as human beings.

We speak about elephants, their intelligence, and how we treat them in captivity.

Guest

Caitrin Keiper, senior editor at journal The New Atlantis, where she wrote "Do Elephants Have Souls?"

This segment aired on April 22, 2019.

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