Mitt Romney Put His Dog On The Top Of His Station Wagon For A 12-Hour Trip...

Romney's treatment of family dog on 1983 vacation becomes issue

From Michael Levenson, Globe Staff

The Globe's disclosure this week that Mitt Romney put his Irish setter into a dog carrier on the roof of his station wagon for a 12-hour trip to Ontario in 1983 has become a surprising flashpoint in the presidential campaign.

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Family members told the Globe that Romney attached a special windshield onto Seamus' carrier to protect him from the wind. Romney was traveling that summer with his wife, five sons, and Seamus to his parent's cottage on Lake Huron. But hours into the ride, Seamus apparently suffered diarrhea, which ran down the back window of the car. Romney's sons, all under 14, howled in disgust. Romney pulled off the road into a service station. There, he borrowed a hose, washed down Seamus and the car, and they drove on to Ontario.

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"Thinking of the wind, the weather, the speed, the vulnerability, the isolation on the roof, it is commonsense that any dog who's under extreme stress might show that stress by losing control of his bowels," Newkirk told Cox. "That alone should have been sufficient indication that the dog was, basically, being tortured."

Cox also pointed out that Massachusetts law prohibits carrying an animal "in or upon a vehicle, or otherwise, in an unnecessarily cruel or inhuman manner or in a way and manner which might endanger the animal carried thereon."