TITLE VI. 

 CRUELTY— GAME LAWS. 



CHAPTER IL 



GAME LAWS. 



128. Power to enact game laws. 130, Right to shoot in private 



129. Capture, sale or possession of lands. 



game in the close season. 



128. Power to Enact Game Laws — It is not intended in the 

 present chapter to give a synopsis of the various game laws 

 of Great Britain and the different States of this country. 

 These are statutes of purely local importance, and compila- 

 tions of them already exist.^ But there are some general 

 principles of law that relate to all of them which cannot be 

 overlooked in a treatise of this nature. 



The ownership of the wild game in a country, in so far as 

 it is capable of ownership, is in the State itself for the benefit 

 of all the people in common.^ The legislature has the right 

 to withhold from or grant to individuals the right to hunt 

 and kill game, or qualify and restrict it, as in the opinion of 

 its members will best subserve the public welfare.^ Nor can 



' See Book of the Game Laws (Forest and Stream Pubg. Co., N. Y.) ; 

 Austin's Farm and Game Law, Ch. XIV; O'Brien's Ont. Game and 

 Fishing Laws, etc. 



' Geer v. Conn., 161 U. S. 519. See, as to property in game, Tit. L 

 Ch. I. supra. 



' Magner v. Peo., 97 III. 320. And see Garcia v. Gunn, 119 Cal. 315. 



557 



