No Writ of Habeas Corpus for Orangutans

How is it possible to type those words -- "writ of habeas corpus for orangutans" -- without your laptop exploding?

It should be instantly recognized as ludicrous. But animal rights activists are suing, or planning to sue, all over the place looking for just one judgewilling to go radical and grant one animal "personhood." In New York, for example, the NonhumanRights Project has brought a similar suit, for which it won a laudatory cover story in the New York Times Magazine.

A few years ago, a B...