Animal welfare focuses on ensuring that animals are treated humanely and with minimal suffering. This includes providing adequate food, water, shelter, and veterinary care. Animal welfare also encompasses the prevention of cruelty and neglect, as well as the promotion of positive animal-human interactions.

Early laws, such as the Massachusetts Bay Colony’s "Offences against Brute Creatures" (1641) and Britain’s "Cruel Treatment of Cattle Act" (1822), were purely welfarist. They targeted egregious acts of sadism—bear-baiting, overworking a horse to death. These laws reinforced the idea that while animals were property, gratuitous cruelty against that property offended human morality.