VALUABLE WILD LIFE 29 



ern man or body of men has raised this question! 

 On the contrary, much of the enthusiastic support 

 of "the McLean bill" and "the Weeks bill" came 

 from southern protectors of wild life, particularly 

 from Alabama, Tennessee and Texas. So far as the 

 southern states are concerned, the old southern 

 states' rights bogey seems to be dead, and we have 

 no fear that an attack on the new bird law ever will 

 be made by southern men. 



But how is it in the North? 



Time brings many changes, some of them both 

 startling and absurd. In the Fifth National Con- 

 servation Congress, held at Washington in 1913, 

 the main assault on the principle of federal control 

 of water-power for the benefit of the people of the 

 nation at large, was led by the representatives of 

 northern states, who set up a loud demand for state 

 control, and state rights! 



The state of New York refused to join in that 

 demand, but later on, the people of that common- 

 wealth were treated to a surprise all their own. In 

 reply to an inquiry from the New York State Con- 

 servation Commission regarding the status of cer- 

 tain trivial differences between the federal bird law 

 and the New York state bird laws, Attorney- 

 General Carmody propounded and published an 

 official opinion to the effect that the federal migra- 

 tory bird law is unconstitutional, and therefore void 

 and of no effect in New York state. Later on, he 



