Legal Aspects of Ritual Slaughter - Other Countries

Other Countries

In the rest of Europe the legal situation of ritual slaughter differs from country to country. While countries that had Nazis and antisemites in parliament and in military dictatorships in occupied Europe in the 1930s and during the war introduced bans, democratic countries - the US, the United Kingdom, Ireland, the Netherlands - introduced legislation protecting shehitah.

Prior to the rise of National Socialism in Germany, bans only existed in Switzerland, Norway and Saxony. When Hitler came to power, the German National Socialist government introduced a ban in the whole of Germany in 1933, and in Poland when it invaded in 1939. Bans were introduced in all the countries which the Nazis occupied, as well as in the countries of the Axis allies: Italy and Hungary. These were removed by order of the Allied Military authorities by a special order, and the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms included sections on Religious Freedom that in the preliminary discussions, referred specifically to religious ritual slaughter bans.

• Countries in which animals must be stunned right after the cut include Denmark, Estonia, Finland, the Lower Austria province.
• Countries that impose stunning before slaughter comprise Norway, Iceland, Switzerland, and Sweden.
• In the Netherlands, a bill introduced by the animal rights party has passed through Parliament, but must be approved by the Senate to become law The Netherlands is one of the countries that introduced legislative protection for shehitah.
• For Belgium, Italy, Ireland, and Portugal further information is needed.

Complete information up to 1946 on every ban introduced in every country in Europe in the original languages and in English translation is to be found in Religious Freedom: The Right to Practice Shehitah (Munk, Munk and Berman) together with references to the original debates and an analysis that claims that until the rise of Hitler in 1933, the international campaign to introduce ritual slaughter/ shehitah bans had failed because the vast majority of countries where legislation had been proposed rejected the legislation realising the involvement of anti-Semites in the campaign and enacted legislation to stave off bans on Jewish and Muslim slaughter. The League of Nations supported the Jewish Community of Upper Silesia against Hitler in rejecting the attempts by German officials to confiscate shehitah knives and ban Jewish slaughter there as had been done in the German Reich.

Article 9 of the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms is headed – Freedom of thought, conscience and religion.

1. Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief, in worship, teaching, practice and observance.

2. Freedom to manifest one's religion or beliefs shall be subject only to such limitations as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society in the interests of public safety, for the protection of public order, health or morals, or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others.

In those countries that have signed the convention, and, at the same time have enacted laws that effectively ban ritual slaughter have a conflict between the Convention and the law. In international law two principles apply: one being which law was enacted first, the other being the intentions of the lawmakers. (This principle was challenged in Pepper v Hart in the context of the UK.

The preparatory discussions for Article 9 of the European Convention dealt specifically with Shehitah as the matter was raised by a Jewish pressure group dealt specifically with effective bans on religious slaughter imposed by the Nazi Reich on countries in occupied Europe raised by a Jewish pressure group, and it has been pointed out that in disputed legislation the proper procedure is to refer back to the debates and discussions at the time of drafting the legislation, in order to see clearly what was intended. (reference later). Those countries that are signatories to the Convention and retain effective bans today are not abiding by the convention.