Category Archives: Regulation of the Day

Not too long ago, I told Marty Hahne’s story. He is a long-time children’s magician who got in trouble with the USDA for using an unlicensed rabbit in his shows. Among other things, he also had to give the agency proof that he was making regular vet visits, and submit to random inspections of his home. The topper was that he had to submit a 28-page disaster plan covering how he would care for his rabbit under at least 21 different calamities.

The publicity surrounding the story caused a bit of a blow to the USDA’s self-esteem. In today’s Federal Register, the USDA’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service announced that it is temporarily suspending the relevant regulations. It is doing this “in order that we may undertake a review of their requirements.”

Time will tell what comes out of this review, but hopefully magicians won’t have to apply for federal license if they want to pull a rabbit out of a hat.

Marty Hahne is a magician in Missouri. He has been putting on magic shows for kids for almost 30 years under the nom de guerre Marty the Magician. Back in 2005, he got in trouble with the USDA. Turns out he was using an unlicensed rabbit for his grand finale of pulling a rabbit out of a hat. Hahne quickly found out that the USDA’s regulations for magicians’ rabbits, in force since 1966, are both strict and extensive.

Eight years later, the agency is still harassing him. Here are some of the indignities the USDA is inflicting on Hahne and his animal assistant:

Hahne has an official USDA license, No. 43-C-0269, for Casey — a three-pound Netherland dwarf rabbit with a look of near-fatal boredom. The rules require Hahne to pay $40 a year, take Casey to the vet and submit to surprise inspections of his home.

Also, if Hahne plans to take the rabbit out of town for an extended period, he must submit an itinerary to the USDA. The 1966 law that started all of this was four pages long. Now, the USDA has 14 pages of regulations just for rabbits.

Now, under new regulations, “animal exhibitors” such as Hahne are required to file written disaster plans to the USDA covering at least 21 types of disaster, from broken air conditioners to hurricanes. Hahne’s disaster plan for Casey is 28 pages long, and is considered short for its genre. An attorney was kind enough to draft it for him pro bono.

When the Washington Post picked up on Hahne’s story, it spread like wildfire on weird news sites, and the Internet had a collective belly laugh at the USDA’s expense. After this blow to its pride, the agency reluctantly announced that Secretary Tom Vilsack has ordered a review of the regulations, insisting that “common sense be applied.”

This is not the same as saying the agency will liberalize its strict magicians’ rabbit policy. But the phrase “common sense” does imply it.

I recently posted that new EU regulations would require restaurants to use factory packaged and sealed bottles of olive oil. This would put small artisanal producers out of business, and reduce consumer choice. Fortunately, the UK Telegraph is reporting that the EU is dropping the olive oil rules due to a public outcry (hat tip Walter Olson):

In a humiliating U-turn, Dacian Ciolos, the European commissioner for agriculture, admitted that the proposed ban on traditional olive oil jugs, had provoked popular loathing, or “misunderstanding”, from the people that he said wanted to protect for their own good.

This is why regulatory transparency is so important. The more people learn about regulation, the less they tend to like it. And when a whopper such as this one comes down the pike, it won’t get repealed unless people find out about it. Mr. Ciolos appears not to have learned his lesson, but results are what matter. He lost. More importantly, consumers and small olive oil producers won.

Neil Armstrong died last weekend at the age of 82. He was an inspirational figure for a lot of reasons besides the obvious one of being the first man to walk on the moon. He took great pride in being a nerdy, pocket-protector wearing engineer. In so doing, he inspired a lot of nerdy kids to keep their chins up, work hard, and accomplish great things. His stoic example made the world a better place.

Armstrong also handled his fame well.  He always maintained a calm, quiet dignity. His steady demeanor presented a sharp contrast with his no-less heroic colleague Buzz Aldrin, who is something of a showman at heart. Armstrong didn’t much care for the spotlight, and happily lived a quiet life in his native Ohio.

Which brings us to today’s Regulation of the Day. It turns out that when Armstrong, Aldrin, and Michael Collins returned to Earth after the Apollo 11 mission, they actually filled out a customs form. The Atlantic recently unearthed the document. It’s hard to tell if the form was an exercise in dry humor or the crew really was required to fill it out.

It’s worth a read. The “Departure from” field is filled in with simply, “moon.” The flight routing proceeds: Cape Kennedy; moon; Honolulu, Hawaii, U.S.A. The cargo manifest includes “moon rock and moon dust samples.” An ominous note sounds in the “Any other condition on board which may lead to the spread of disease” field: a typewritten, all-caps “TO BE DETERMINED.”

One wonders if today’s astronauts still fill out customs forms when they return home.