Forest and Stream 
A Weekly Journal of the Rod and Gun. 
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\ NEW YORK, SATURDAY, MARCH 7, 1896 
j VOL, XLVL— No. 10. 
I No. 318 Broadway, Nbw York 
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The Forest and Stream will shortly re- 
move to new offices in the New York 1 ife 
Building, No. 346 Broadway, entrance on 
Leonard Street. 
NON=EXPORT LAW UPHELD 
A TRIUMPH FOR GAME PROTECTION. 
The Supreme Court of the United States handed down 
its decision last Monday, March 2, in the case of Edgar 
M. Greer, plaintiff in error, vs. the State of Connecticut. 
The point at issue was the constitutionality of the Con- 
necticut statute forbidding the export of game. The de- 
cision upholds the law and affirms its constitutionality. 
The importance of the decision cannot be overestimated. 
It is a great triumph for the cause of game protection. 
In October of 1889 Edgar M. Geer, of New .London, 
Conn., was prosecuted on the charge of having in his 
possession certain game birds with intent to procure 
their transportation beyond the limits of the State. The 
birds, it was conceded, had been lawfully killed in the 
open season. They were at the time of their seizure in 
transit from New London, Conn., to the city of New 
York, on board one of the boatB of the Norwich Line. 
They had been bought by Geer in open market in New 
London, and were in course of shipment to the markets 
of New York under contract of sale. The statute under 
which the action was brought reads as follows: 
Exportation.— Sec. 2546. No person shall at any time kill any wood- 
cock, ruffed grouse, or quail for the purpose of conveying the same 
beyond the limits of this State; nor shall transport, or have in posses- 
sion with intent to procure the transportation beyond said limits, any 
of such birds killed within this State. The reception by any person 
within this State of any such bird or birds for shipment to a point 
without the State shall be prima facie evidence that said bird or birds 
were killed within the State for the purpose of carrying the same be- 
yond its limits. Seo. 2647. Any person violating any of the provisions 
of the preceding section shall be fined not less than $7 nor more than 
$50. 
Geer was found guilty and took his case up to the 
Supreme Court of Errors for Connecticut, which sus- 
tained the lower courts in the following words: 
It being conceded that the State, under its general police power, may 
lawfully prohibit the killing of the game birds in question, it may, of 
course, control such killing and the times and purposes thereof. It 
may lawfully enact that, they may be killed and sold and held for sale 
only for domestic consumption. The State in the exercise of its 
power, instead of prohibiting the killing altogether, permits the per- 
son killing them to acquire only a qualified right in them, namely, the 
right to appropriate them to his own use, and the right to sell or 
transport them for domestic use. 
The birds in question never became articles of commerce within the 
meaning of the term contended for by the defendant. They be- 
came private property of a qualified character. The law limited 
the purposes for which they might be killed and become ^private 
property. The difference between property of this sort and the 
ordinary private property of commerce is obvious. 
The case was then carried to the Supreme Court of the 
United States, the question at issue being this : "Can a 
State, after permitting the killing of game birds, and after 
allowing them to be bought and sold in the markets of 
the State, impose the restriction that they cannot be 
transported beyond the limits of the State. Or, in other 
words, can a State by legislative enactments constitute 
game birds an article of domestic commerce as dis- 
tinguished from and as prohibiting inter-State commerce 
in them ?" 
The specifications of errors claimed to have been made 
by the Connecticut Court were as follows : 
First.— In refusing to hold that so much of Section 2546 
as may be construed to forbid the transportation from the 
State of birds lawfully killed and permitted by the laws 
of the State to become the subject of traffic and commerce 
is unconstitutional and void. 
Second.— In refusing to hold that so much of the sec- 
tion as may be construed to forbid the receiving and 
having in possession, with the intention to procure the 
transportation thereof to another State, birds therein de- 
scribed lawfully killed and permitted by the laws of the 
State to become the subject of traffic and commerce is 
unconstitutional and void. 
Third.— In holding that the defendant is guilty of an 
offense under said section, if such birds were lawfully 
killed in the State and were bought by the defendant in 
the market of the State, as articles of property, merchan- 
dise and commerce, and had begun to move as an article 
of inter-State commerce. 
Certain minor questions relating to the phraseology of 
the statute were brushed aside, and the case, as referred 
to the Supreme Court, by agreement had to do only with 
the question thus briefly stated: 
Has a State such a proprietary interest in game that it 
can permit the killing and selling in open markets, and 
impose a restriction that they cannot be sold, to be taken 
out of the State? Or, in other words, has the State such 
proprietary interest in game that it can constitute game 
an article of commerce within the State and forbid its be- 
coming an article of inter-State commerce? 
The plaintiff in error insisted that the State has not 
such power, and that when it permits an article to be- 
come a subject of commerce it cannot restrict it terri- 
torially without conflicting with Article 1, Section 8, of 
the Constitution of the United States, which ,gives Con- 
gress control of inter-State commerce. It was contended 
that there cannot be articles of State commerce which 
may not become articles of inter-State commerce; that 
there is no such shadowy, uncertain, indefinable state 
where an article is for some purposes an article of com- 
merce and for others is not; and it was argued that in the 
case under discussion the birds had commenced to move 
as an article of commerce from one State to another, and 
from that moment they became a subject of inter-State 
commerce and could be controlled only by national regu- 
lation, not by police power of the State. 
For the defendant in error the points made were as 
follows, in defense of the statute: 
"1. Merely having property in one's possession, with an 
intent to transport it beyond the limits of a State, does 
not make it a subject matter of inter-State commerce 
within the meaning of the term contended for by the 
plaintiff in error. 
"2. The law in question relates only to game killed 
within the State, and is of that class of legislation where- 
by States seek to regulate killing of game and its con- 
sumption. 
"The State of Connecticut has prohibited the killing of 
such game between the first day of January and the first 
day of October following in each year. 
"And as above stated, it prohibits any one having such 
game in his possession at any time with an intent to trans- 
port it beyond its limits. It seeks by its game laws to 
preserve game from destruction and to Limit its consump- 
tion to those within its territorial limits. 
"3. No one has any property in such birds in their wild 
and unrestrained condition, and the right of the law mak- 
ing power to restrict or to prohibit the taking of such ani- 
mals ferce naturae, as go under the denomination of game, 
has always been recognized. 
"4. By the law of the State of Connecticut such game 
cannot be the subject of absolute ownership. No one can 
acquire other than a qualified property therein, and is de- 
prived of the right to transport it beyond the State. 
"It being unlawful for one to kill such game or to have 
it in his possession for the purpose of transporting it be- 
yond the limits of the State, it follows that it could not 
become a subject matter of inter- State commerce, and the 
law complained of is not in violation of the Constitu- 
tion of the United States or any law of Congress relative 
thereto. 
"5. It is submitted that the State of Connecticut had 
absolute control of the subject matter of this suit, and that 
no one can acquire within its limits any right to game 
killed within that State other than it by law permits, or 
do anything with such game that it by law prohibits. Its 
power in these respects is supreme. It is a matter of in- 
ternal police regulation." 
The case was filed with the Supreme Court in the Octo- 
ber term of 1895 and its decision was given out last Mon- 
day. The Connecticut courts are upheld. The law is 
sustained. The Supreme Court of the United States de- 
clares that a State may control its own game; that it may 
prescribe not only seasons and methods for taking game, 
but limitation as to the use, disposition and destination of 
game after it shall have been taken and acquired as prop- 
erty of a qualified character. If the State provides that 
its game may not be captured for export and that it may 
not be exported, such provisions, the Supreme Court says, 
are constitutional and are not in conflict with the princi- 
ple which gives to Congress exclusive control of inter- 
State commerce; for game so controlled — and this is the 
basic principle — cannot become a lawful subject of inter- 
State commerce. Here is a brief of the decision, as wired 
by a special correspondent, and received" just as we are 
going to press: 
Washington, D. C., March 3.— Special to Forest and 
Stream: In the Supreme Court decision in the case of Ed- 
gar M. Geer vs. State of Connecticut, it is decided that the 
State has power to make it an offense to have in possession 
for the purpose of transportation beyond the State birds 
which had been lawfully killed within the State during the 
open season; and that the statute, in creating this offense, 
did not violate the inter-State commerce clause of the 
United States Constitution. 
That it was lawful under the United States Constitution 
for the State to allow the killing of birds within the State 
during a designated open season and to allow such birds 
when so killed to be used, to be sold and to be bought for 
use within the State; and yet to forbid their transportation 
beyond the State. 
That the State had the power to regulate the killing of 
game within her borders so as to confine its use to the limits 
of the State and forbid its transmission outside the State. 
The court discussed the authorities, foreign and domestic, 
showing the nature of property in game and the authority 
of the State in relation thereto. The court holds that the 
right to preserve game flows from the existence in the State 
of a police power to that end, which is none the less because 
inter-State commerce may be remotely and indirectly af- 
fected. That the source of the police power as to game birds 
flows from the duty of the State to preserve for its people a 
valuable food supply. 
That the State may allow its own citizens the benefits of 
the property in game without permitting citizens of other 
States to participate. 
That, the power of the State to control the killing of and 
ownership in game being admitted, the commerce in game 
which the State law permitted was only internal commerce 
not subject to the United States Constitution, and the re- 
striction that it should not become the subject of external 
commerce went along with the grant and was a part of it. 
This decision is precisely what we have so often declared 
that we believed would be the result of a non-export game 
case if it could be carried up to the court of last resort. 
The law is based on justice, and under existing conditions 
is essential to the protection of the game of this country. 
The principles set forth by the^Supreme Court apply not 
only „to Connecticut, but to every State in the Union 
which has a similar non-export law or may have one. 
The decision goes far toward the solution of the problem 
of game protection in this country. It points the way in 
which effort should be expended in game legislation. It 
provides a way for cutting off the shipment of game to 
market. It gives added significance to the Forest and 
Stream's Platform Plank, that the sale of game should 
be prohibited at all seasons. It enunciates anew the right 
of the State to control its own. It asserts once more that 
the interest of the many and the rights of the citizen in 
nature's bounty may be defended against the aggressions 
of the few. It should give new courage and confidence 
to all engaged in opposing the ruinous traffic in game. 
The decision is particularly opportune at this time, when 
sundry well-meaning individuals and associations are 
petitioning Congress to remedy what they mistakenly be- 
lieve to be a constitutional defect of State laws forbidding 
the export of game. We printed, some weeks ago, a bill 
prepared by City Attorney Williams, of Denver, Colo., 
for introduction by a Colorado Congressman, to forbid 
the export of game from Colorado, Wyoming and Utah; 
and the reason which Mr. Williams gave for asking Con- 
gress to take action in the matter was that such a regula- 
tion of game export was constitutionally beyond the 
province of the States concerned. But according to this 
decision of the Supreme Court the States themselves may 
provide all legislation requisite to effect the desired pur- 
pose. They may withhold the privilege of killing game 
for transportation from the State. 
The National Game, Bird and Fish Protective Associa- 
tion is also engaged in the exploitation of a measure to 
be introduced in Congress to amend the inter- State com- 
merce law by prohibiting the export of game from one 
State to another; and the reason put forward for the 
national movement is.the same as that adduced* by Mr. 
Williams, that the individual States themselves are 
powerless to provide such restrictions. This decision 
of the Supreme Court, however, shows that even if 
the measure sought by the National Association were 
practicable or might be beneficial, it is in no wise essen- 
tial to game protection. Every State has in itself consti- 
tutional authority to forbid the taking of its own game 
and fish for any purpose other than consumption within 
its own borders. 
The decision is a triumph for game protection. It 
points the way to legislation which if enforced will be 
most effective. Here is another Platform Plank: Forbid 
the taking of game for export to market. 
