28 GAME KEFTJGES. 



Mr. Williams. I think I have stated all that I desire to state to the 

 committee. 



Mr. Jacoway. If not, we want you to go ahead, but we have some 

 other gentlemen who desire to be heard. 



Mr. Williams. I merely want to add this in closing, that the 

 Supreme Court of the United States has practically ruled, in the 

 Mid-West Oil decision (236 U. S., 459), upon the right of the Presi- 

 dent to withdraw from entry under the public land laws certain 

 areas of land for the purpose of protecting the birds on there. In 

 other words, the Supreme Court has practically ruled upon the 

 validity of the act of June 28, 1906, forbidding the killing of any 

 birds on these lands of the United States set aside for the use of the 

 Department of Agriculture. 



Mr. Jacoway. Is not this the turning point in all of those cases: 

 That the Government reserves the fee in those lands and that the 

 fee never passes from the Federal Government to the lessees ? 



Mr. Williams. Absolutely, and it may control that fee. 



Mr. Jacoway. But the ownership to the birds and wild animals 

 is in the States, according to your contention ? 



Mr. Williams. No; all of the decisions of the courts say that such 

 property as exists in wild things flying through the air is in the legisla- 

 ture of the State in trust for the benefit of the citizens of that State, 

 and it may, under its police power, regulate the killing or capturing 

 of them as it sees fit. 



There is no property question in game involved in this at all. This 

 bill is not predicated upon any property in wild game being in the 

 United States, but it is predicated upon the property in the public 

 lands being in the United States, and it has the right, like an indi- 

 vidual has the right, to say "No one shall come upon these lands 

 for certain specific purposes." But even the right of ownership of 

 land is subject to the power of the State, to its power of eminent 

 domain, the power to send officers of the law in there to stop riots and 

 things of that kind. 



Those are necessary limitations upon the individual's right, but he 

 may say that no man may go upon his land to hunt if he wants to do 

 so. There are statutes in every State, I suppose, prohibiting people 

 from going upon private land if the owner posts a notice forbidding 

 trespass. But the idea of the fee being in the United States, as 

 regards the public lands, really has no bearing upon the question of 

 whether there is any property in the United States as to wild birds. 

 Congress is not legislating about this thing on the theory that it has 

 any right to legislate solely for the protection of the game as such, 

 but it is on the theory that it has the right to control the lands of the 

 United States for such purposes as it sees fit, and that it has that 

 power is so abundantly shown in the decisions of the Supreme Court 

 that I do not see how the committee could come to any other con- 

 clusion than that Congress has the right, not only that it is proposing 

 to assert now, but that it has already actually asserted, as I pointed 

 out in my opening remarks. 



I am very much obliged to the committee. 



