158 WILD LIFE PROTECTION FUND 



cepted and observed both the letter and the spirit of the 

 law, as making for the good of all. To the vast majority 

 the law is sufficient as it stands. 



For another element, however, the law is not, and never 

 has been, strong enough. In certain respects its machinery- 

 is weak, and its enforcement against determined opposition 

 has been very difficult. In the disaffected area of Missouri 

 and adjacent states, a few unprincipled persons have taken 

 all possible advantage of the weakness of the law. The Greth- 

 ers, the Holthauses and others like them have continually 

 held up the law to public contempt, and continually harped 

 upon the results of the weaknesses of the act. The men who 

 have done their level best to uphold the law and preserve 

 its benefits pending a strengthening of the act, have been 

 criticized, ridiculed and sneered at, by Grether and others, 

 to the limits of available newspaper space. 



It is high time for Congress to remedy the defects in the 

 migratory bird law, and make the act so strong that no 

 spring-shooter ever again will dare to try to bring it into 

 contempt. 



ATTACKS ON THE ADMINISTRATION OF THE LAW 

 AND THE BIOLOGICAL SURVEY 



The so-called "petition" from Kansas City to Congress 

 is chiefly an attack on the Department of Agriculture and 

 the Biological Survey, because the demands of a few 

 Missouri duck-shooters have not been met, and because im- 

 possible things have not been accomplished in the punish- 

 ment of violators of the law. The work of the Biological 

 Survey stands on far too firm a foundation of principle and 

 achievement to need at this time any defense from me. The 

 men who really protect our wild life, on a grand scale, and 

 get results, always make numerous enemies, and frequently 

 are assailed — sometimes even in the Senate of the United 

 States! That is to be counted as "all in the day's work!" 

 The "good fellows" are the men who permit the killers of 

 wild life to do exactly as they please. 



