LICENSES. 35 



requiring residents to secure licenses has been adopted b} r 19 States, 

 and in spite of the small license fee large incomes have been derived 

 from this source. The prejudice against requiring a resident or 

 citizen of a State to pay any fee, however small, for the privilege 

 of hunting is gradually disappearing, and doubtless the change in 

 sentiment will result in the establishment of State service in the re- 

 maining States, mostly Southern, where no such system now prevails. 

 The license system, as a source of revenue for the maintenance of 

 the game department, may well be considered to have originated in 

 1895, but of the four States adopting the system in that year only 

 two, Michigan and North Dakota, directed the funds to be applied to 

 game protection. a The Michigan license was required for hunting 

 deer only; the fee was $25 for nonresidents and 50 cents for resi- 

 dents, and the receipts from the nonresident licenses were equally 

 divided between the State and the county of issue. The county funds 

 thus obtained were applied by the county commissioners to the pro- 

 tection of game, and the State funds were used for payment of salaries 

 of the State warden and his deputies. By some oversight, no provision 

 was made for the disposition of the resident license fees, and notwith- 

 standing the opinion of the attorney-general, furnished upon request 

 of the State warden, that these fees should be distributed in like 

 manner as the nonresident fees, the county clerks refused to so dis- 

 pose of them, contending that such fees were rightfully theirs as com- 

 pensation for services rendered in issuing the licenses. Under the first 

 year's operation of this law 22 nonresident and 14,477 resident licenses 

 were issued. The legislature of 1897 increased the resident license fee 

 to 75 cents, rectified the omission in the law of 1895, and remodeled the 

 scheme of disposition of fees by allowing the issuing clerk 25 cents of 

 every fee as his compensation, the county supervisors 25 cents of the 

 resident-license fee for enforcement of the game law in their respective 

 counties, and the State treasurer the remainder of all fees, for pay- 

 ment of salaries and traveling expenses of the State warden and his 

 deputies. In the first year of the existence of this law there were 

 issued 11,867 resident and 44 nonresident licenses, the receipts from 

 which provided a State game fund of $4,055.75 and a county game 

 fund of $2,966.75, or a total of $7,022.50. For the time covered by 

 the foregoing figures, 1897, the total expenses of the State game 

 warden's office were $6,444.08; hence the receipts from the license 

 system alone (in addition to $6,208.32 collected in fines) were more 

 than sufficient to meet the salaries and all expenses of the State 

 game department and its deputy wardens. Had the license system 

 been general and not restricted to deer alone it is evident the receipts 

 from this source would have been much greater. In this connection 



« The other two, Minnesota and Wyoming, required only nonresident licenses. 

 One of the principal objects of the Wyoming license was to prevent nonresident 

 Indians from hunting in the State. (See Eecreation, Vol. 12, p. 443, June, 1900.) 



