APPENDIX. 
69 
As to the constitutionality of the law requiring aliens to pay a 
larger fee than citizens of the state, a recent decision of the Supreme 
Court of Alabama in the case of Luke vs. Calhoun County on the right 
of the state to impose different license fees, the language used by the 
court is clean-cut and decisive. It says in part: “It is a legal and 
political axiom that protection and allegiance are reciprocal. Aliens, 
resident or sojourning here, do not owe the full measure of allegiance 
exacted from the citizen, nor can they enjoy the rights, privileges, and 
immunities of citizenship.” 
At the last session of the legislature we recommended that the law 
be amended to permit a 10 per cent commission to be paid to every 
person selling licenses, except a fish and game commissioner. This 
became necessary in order to provide a way in which county clerks could 
be compensated for the money actually expended in postage, the labor 
involved in the issuing of licenses, and correspondence in relation 
thereto. A number of bills were introduced in the interest of county . 
clerks asking that a commission be allowed ranging from 5 to 20 per 
cent. We believe the allowance of 10 per cent is ample. It means 
an annual drain on the fish and game preservation fund of at least 
$12,000.00. As the law has become thoroughly understood and the 
county clerks have distributed licenses in the principal towns in their 
respective counties, the postage charges have been greatly reduced. 
In none of them has it exceeded 4 per cent, leaving a margin of profit for 
time and labor of 6 per cent, which may be considered reasonable com¬ 
pensation. 
The money derived from the sale of hunting licenses is used for 
the payments of salaries to deputies directly engaged in the enforcement 
of the game laws, in commissions to county clerks, the maintenance of 
the Game Farm, bounties on mountain lions, the trapping, distribution, 
and introduction of game birds, a proportion of office expenses, and 
the propagation of game fishes. Those who pay for hunting licenses are 
not contributing toward the support of the commercial hatcheries. 
All fines of whatever character are paid into the same fund as the 
hunting license money, the fish and game preservation fund; they 
amount approximately to $16,000.00 a year, which more than meets the 
expense involved in the propagation of trout and other game fishes. 
The amount of hunting license sales by counties since the law became 
effective, July 1,1907, is shown in the tables given in the Appendix. The 
apparent discrepancy between these records and the amount shown by 
our financial statement is due to the fact that at the close of the fiscal 
year all county clerks, had not made final settlement with the controller. 
