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U.S. GOVERNMENT 1: Dog Influences Congress

Of all the senators and representatives who have ever taken the floor in Congress, it was not a senator or representative, but one four-legged companion, who influenced many. Beau, a 13-year-old yellow Labrador retriever, died December 9, leaving behind a legacy.

It all began in 1997, when Moira Shea, at the time an aide to Sen. Ron Wyden, was prohibited from bringing Beau into Senate. Shea, who suffers from Usher’s Syndrome, which causes blindness and deafness, required Beau to lead her around the Washington, D.C. area where she worked.

There were no specific rules regarding guide dogs in the forums, but Congress had agreed two years earlier to abide by the same guidelines that it had passed for others, which meant that there were no laws against the guide dog.

Sen. Wyden quickly rose to the floor and pleaded the case of Shea, and effectively sent the motion to pass a resolution to allow the blind to use guide dogs, saying that “guide dogs are working dogs, not pets,” according to the National Federation for the Blind website, which published an article in 1997.

Shea received Beau in 1994 after realizing that her vision was getting worse. For the next 11 years, Beau accompanied Shea everywhere, from offices to nuclear facilities, to vacationing overseas with his owner. In 2002, Beau retired from service but stayed in the family.

--Written by Joanne Tang

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