38 



THE GAME BREEDER 



day fishing. It is wrong in our opinion, 

 decidedly wrong, in complaining that the 

 Legislature missed the chance of "doing 

 a half-dozen constructive things" ; mak- 

 ing about a half-dozen more restrictive 

 laws. 



More Game and Fewer Game Laws. 



The real constructive methods con- 

 templated by those who favor the more 

 game and fewer game laws idea include 

 amendments to existing laws so that it 

 will be no longer criminal to profitably 

 produce any species of food on a farm. 

 The fact that not only half a dozen old 

 style constructive things were over- 

 looked in New York is fully offset by 

 the fact that as many as ninety of the old 

 style "game protection" laws have been 

 enacted in a single season and profes- 

 sional wild lifers and protectionists have 

 been at this game of getting more game 

 laws for over 50 years with the result 

 that the enactments are so numerous that 

 no lawyer knows what all the laws are 

 about. The people, however, are pre- 

 sumed to know the law and The Sun as 

 well as other papers has denounced fool 

 arrests which, in our opinion, are espe- 

 cially objectionable, oftentimes, because 

 nothing like moral turpitude appears in 

 the offences and, in fact, the things done 

 are considered right and laudable often 

 in the older countries — the taking of 

 wild birds and eggs for breeding pur- 

 poses for example. 



Certain it is that after 50 years' trial, 

 the game laws have not made the grouse 

 and the quail plentiful in the markets. 

 Certain it is that thousands of birds 

 freed from the game law restrictions 

 are shot every season and many are 

 sold as food in places where the laws 

 permit the necessary industry required 

 to produce the food. 



Wild Duck Abundance. 



It is said there will be a shortage in 

 the sales of straw hats this year of over 

 a million hats because Uncle Sam will 

 supply that number of hats to men who 

 will not buy "straws." 



The fact that a great number of the 

 Canadian sportsmen are not shooting 



wild ducks and have not been for some 

 years furnishes a sufficient reason for 

 the increase in the number of wild ducks 

 which has been noted. A million gun- 

 ners in Canada and the United States 

 not shooting 30 or even 10 ducks each in 

 a day during a long open season or dur- 

 ing the days given to sport resulted, no 

 doubt, in many ducks, possibly many mil- 

 lions being spared, and, of course, that 

 many ducks should produce many more 

 ducks in the Northern States, wnere 

 State laws for years have prohibited 

 shooting in the nesting season. 



The Migratory Bird Bill. 



Those who are endeavoring to put 

 over on the Congress the legal absurd- 

 ity, known as the migratory bird bill, 

 urge as a reason for its passage the fact 

 that since it has passed the Senate it has 

 resulted in all the ducks becoming nu- 

 merous as reported. These people may 

 possibly believe that one more game law 

 half made has produced a big lot of 

 ducks, but real naturalists know that 

 ducks are not made that way. 



The law evidently was suggested by 

 someone entirely ignorant of natural 

 history and we have charged repeatedly 

 that it was not written by a lawyer or 

 by anyone having an elementary knowl- 

 edge of what a criminal law should be 

 and no one has challenged our asser- 

 tions. The idea always seems to be 

 when such legislation is afoot to keep 

 as still as possible about its demerits and 

 to sneak it through quietly at the end of 

 a session. 



Statesmen and Careless Politicians. 



The statesman who carefully reads a 

 bill and who' considers it carefully is apt 

 to vote right, but too often the careless 

 politician who listens to those whose liv- 

 ing may depend upon their getting more 

 laws and who are always running to the 

 people for more "stuff" to get more laws 

 appears to be in the majority and the 

 result is a mass of absurd legislation 

 which is worse than absurd when it cre- 

 ates a lot of fanciful crimes, especially 

 crimes which often we have properly 

 designated as "food production crimes" 



