We woke in Boston before daybreak as usual, and Hammy — my beagle, who was once a lab dog used in research — stretched, a squeak escaping from his yawn. I prepared my oatmeal and served him breakfast, then we bundled up and headed to Boston Common to meet Larry Carbone, who was then a visiting fellow at the Harvard Law School Animal Law and Policy Program.

The Common, considered the country’s oldest park, has been an important space for public assembly for centuries: On that land, George Washington celebrated the nation’s independence, women’s suffragists held rallies, and Charles Lindbergh inspired crowds with visions of the future of commercial aviation. (A few years after his celebrated transatlantic flight, in 1927, Lindbergh conducted animal experiments at the Rockefeller Institute f

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