THE LEGITIMATE USE OF GAME 109 



possible by sensible game laws, a grasp on the 

 guides and a real enforcement of the game laws. 



Now, what is the great obstacle to the production 

 of 2,000,000 deer per year in the United States for 

 food purposes? 



Stated without any euphemism, it is the greed, 

 ignorance and utterly unwarranted notions of 

 "personal liberty" that often combine in the Ameri- 

 can individual. The ethics of sport and game pres- 

 ervation in America are as yet in their swaddling 

 clothes. In fact, it is no exaggeration to say that 

 until very recently, American sportsmen who shoot 

 game have been without codes of ethics. With 95 

 per cent of the men who shoot, the one dominant 

 idea is to get the game, at all hazards, and in the 

 killing of it, anything that is "lawful" is necessarily 

 fair! Millions of game birds and mammals have 

 been killed in the United States because the law 

 unwisely permitted it, because the chance offered, 

 and in order to "kill it before it should be killed by 

 some other fellow." 



Now and then, a faint effort is made toward 

 giving the game a fair show; but such efforts have 

 been feeble and spasmodic. Only a few of our 

 states have emerged from the bogs of barbarism far 

 enough to protect fawns and female deer, and per- 

 mit only the killing of bucks with horns not less than 

 four inches in length. To-day in Pennsylvania a 

 graduated M.D., backed by a club of alleged 

 "sportsmen," is bitterly contesting the right of the 



