In 1963, Alice Morgan Wright wrote twelve simple principles to guide the humane care of animals. These principles have been the guiding light and fundamental underpinning of NHES. 

NHES’S 12 Guiding Principles

1.To oppose cruelty in all its forms

2. To strive for an end to bullfighting, rodeo, and all cruel sports wherever performed and   wherever represented as art or as entertainment

3. To strive to abolish cruel trapping

4. To discourage hunting, especially as a sport

5. To oppose all poisoning of wildlife

6. To protect and conserve wildlife for its own sake and not as a resource for Man’s exploitation

7. To aid or initiate programs for slaughter reform

8. To teach humane handling and care of work animals and food animals

9. To advance programs for the humane sterilization of cats and dogs in order to reduce their overpopulation

10. To provide for the rescue, housing and feeding of lost, stray or abandoned animals, until suitable homes are found

11. To urge that when it is necessary to put any tame animal to death, unless some better method of euthanasia is available, it be so arranged that the animal be held in the arms of some human friend while it is being given a painless, preliminary anesthetic, to be stroked and comforted with reassuring words until it loses consciousness, after which the lethal agent should be quickly administered.

12.To recognize in animals their capacity for friendship and their need of friends. To befriend all Earth’s creatures, of the land, the sea and the air; to defend them against ravages by mankind; and to inspire in human beings compassion for all