
_ ait App eis 
EDITOR’S CORNER. 
adapted to consumption as food or to any 
other useful purpose, is a matter of public 
interest, and it is within the police power 
of the ’State, as the representative of the 
people in their united sovereignty, to make 
such laws as will best preserve such game, 
and secure its beneficial use in the future 
to the citizens, and to that end it may adopt 
any reasonable regulations, not only as to 
time and manner in which such game may 
be taken and killed, but also imposing limi- 
tations on the right of property in such 
game -after it has been reduced to posses- 
sion. Such limitations deprive no person 
of his property, because he who takes or 
kills game had no previous right of prop- 
erty in it, and when he acquires such right 
by reducing it to possession he does so 
subject to such conditions and limitations 
as the Legislature has seen fit to impose.” 
2. Supreme Court of United qn, are 
v. State of Maryland, (59 U. 
“That part of the law in en con- 
taining the prohibition and inflicting the 
penalty, which appears to have been applied 
by the State court to this case, is as follows: 
(1833, ch. 254). 
‘AN ACT TO PREVENT THE DESTRUCTION OF 
OYSTERS IN THE WATERS OF THIS STATE. 
‘Whereas, the destruction of oysters in 
the waters of this State is seriously appre- 
hended, from the destructive instrument 
used in taking them, therefore 
“Sec. 1. Be it enacted by the General 
Assembly of Maryland, That it shall be 
unlawful to take or catch oysters in any of 
the waters of this State with a scoop or 
drag, or any other instrument than such 
tongs and rakes as are now in use, and 
authorized by law; and all persons what- 
ever are hereby forbid the use of such in- 
struments in taking or catching oysters in 
the waters of this State, on pain of for- 
feiting to the State the boat or vessel em- 
ployed for the purpose, together with her 
papers, furniture, tackle, and apparel, and 
all things on board the same.’ 
“The State holds the propriety of this 
soil for the conservation of the public 
rights of fishery thereon, and may regulate 
the modes of that enjoyment so as to pre- 
vent the destruction of the fishery. In other 
words, it may forbid all such acts as would 
render the public right less valuable, or de- 
stroy it altogether. This power results 
from the ownership of the soil, from the 
legislative jurisdiction of the State over it, 
and from its duty to preserve unimpaired 
those public uses for which the soil is held. 
“So much of this law as is above cited 
may be correctly said to be not in con- 
flict with, but in furtherance of, any and all 
public rights of taking oysters, whatever 
they may be.” c 
321 
3. Supreme Court of United States, (Law- 
ton v. Steele, 152, U. S., 133). 
“The preservation of game and fish, how- 
ever, has always been treated as within the 
proper domain of the police power, and 
laws limiting the season within which birds 
and wild animals may be killed or exposed 
for sale, and prescribing the time and man- 
ner in which fish may be caught, have been 
repeatedly upheld by the courts.” 

GIVE IT YOUR AID, 
H. R. 11584. 
A bill for the protection of wild animals 
and birds in the Wichita Forest Reserve. 
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of 
Representatives of the United States of 
America in Congress assembled, That the 
President of the United States is hereby 
authorized to designate such areas in the 
Wichita Forest Reserve as should, in his 
opinion, be set aside for the protection of 
game animals and birds and be recognized 
as a breeding place therefor. 
Sec. 2. That when such areas have been 
designated as provided for in section one 
of this Act, hunting, trapping, killing, or 
capturing of game animals and birds upon 
the lands of the United States within the 
limits of said areas shall be unlawful, ex- 
cept under such regulations as may be pre- 
scribed, from time to time, by the Secre- 
tary of Agriculture; and any persons vio- 
lating such regulations or the provisions 
of this Act shall be deemed guilty of a mis- 
demeanor, and shall, upon conviction in any 
United States court of competent jurisdic- 
tion, be fined in a sum not exceeding one 
thousand dollars or be imprisoned for a 
period not exceeding one year, or shall suf- 
fer both fine and imprisonment, in the dis- 
cretion of the court. 
Sec. 3. That it is the purpose of this 
Act to protect from trespass the public 
lands of the United States and the game 
animals and birds which may be thereon, 
and not to interfere with the operation of 
the local game laws as affecting private, 
State, or Territorial lands. 
Every sportsman in the land should write 
his Congressman and Senator at once urg- 
ing prompt and favorable action on this bill. 
Our object is eventually to induce Congress 
to inclose a portion of this tract with a 
high wire fence and make a quail breeding 
farm of it. The government would then 
buy several thousand live birds, amputate 
the first joint of one wing of each and 
turn them into this field to breed. Then as 
fast as the young birds mature they could 
be netted and shipped to the Northern 
States for restocking depleted areas. 
Please act promptly in this matter and 
have as many as possible of your friends 
do so, 
