Joseph Morse Greene
Joseph Morse Greene was an American activist for animal rights and welfare. He was the co-founder and treasurer of the New England Anti-Vivisection Society.
Biography
Greene graduated from Tufts University. He resided at Dorchester, Boston and devoted his career to writing on the behalf of animals. He was a supporter of the Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals and presented arguments against hunting in the daily newspapers of Boston. He authored and distributed articles he had written in leaflet form. He opposed the use of trained animals at the theatre.Greene was a staunch anti-vivisectionist who argued that vivisection did not advance medical knowledge or relieve human suffering and that it would ultimately lead to human experimentation. He described vivisection as unscientific and a moral deterioration due to the suffering of the animals experimented upon.
In 1890, Greene authored a prize winning anti-vivisection essay for a contest sponsored by George T. Angell of the American Humane Education Society. He was awarded $250. In 1895, Greene founded the New England Anti-Vivisection Society with Philip G. Peabody. He was corresponding secretary and treasurer of NEAVS. Greene was the editor of their magazine, The Animals' Defender which he used to promote anti-vaccination material.
In the 1890s, Greene testified at Massachusetts State House hearings against professors William T. Sedgwick, Charles W. Eliot and Henry P. Bowditch for promoting animal experimentation. In 1900, he was awarded a gold badge from members of NEAVS in appreciation of his work for the society. In 1901, he was a speaker at an anti-vivisection meeting for the American Humane Society with Elizabeth Stuart Phelps Ward. In 1907, he compiled an anti-vivisection leaflet for the International Ethical Society filled with quotes from eminent medical authorities.
Greene became a strict vegetarian in his later years for ethical and health reasons.