Diana Belais

Diana Belais (1858–1944) was an American animal rights activist and anti-vivisectionist. She was the founder of the New York Anti-Vivisection Society.

Career

As a young lady, Belais became interested in animal welfare by witnessing horses with large cargo loads slipping on the streets in severe winter conditions. She became an active member of the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.

Belais was the co-founder with her husband of the New York Humane Society in 1893. She was the founder of the New York Anti-Vivisection Society which was organized at a public meeting at Carnegie Hall in February 1908. Celebrities such as Minnie Maddern Fiske, Clara Morris and Emma Eames attended. The bill was not successful. She pushed for another State regulation and supervision bill in 1910. In 1913, Belais protested against the Rockefeller Institute charging that Alexis Carrel was practicing cruel animal experiments at the institute. The New York Anti-Vivisection Society established a booth next to the Rockefeller Institute urging local citizens to rescue animals from the institute.

Belais wrote anti-vivisection articles in the Cosmopolitan magazine. She argued that animal experimentation was closely related to research exploitation of humans as in both cases the most vulnerable became subjects of experiments. She warned about the danger of clinical trials on children with tuberculin in Baltimore and New York. Belias campaigned for legislation prohibiting the vivisection of dogs and in Albany testified at a hearing of an anti-vivisection bill.

In 1935, an election fight of the Society was taken to the supreme court by a defeated minority on charges that they were barred from election voting. Members were dissatisfied with how Belais was managing the Society as president. The Society dissolved in 1938 over an internal dispute.

Belais was director of the Medical Freedom League. She was editor of The Open Door magazine from 1895 to 1938, an animal welfare magazine. She was married to David Belais (1863–1933) the inventor of white gold. An obituary noted that "she could have led a life of ease, but she preferred to give her time and talents and money to trying to liberate the helpless, and virtually friendless, creatures, who could not speak for themselves".

Selected publications

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