The Game Refuge Bill 
STATEMENTS OF SENATORS REED AND 
WADSWORTH 
The professional protectionists, ex-officials and 
petty politicians who have lost faith in their states 
and their ability to function in affairs that are 
rightfully their own, should be questioned by the 
sportsmen who are following them. Before rush- 
ing blindly into new legislation, every citizen of 
this land should carefully consider the statement 
made by Senator James A. Reed of Missouri before 
the Nebraska Bar Association. “If the march to- 
wards centralism of power in the federal govern- 
ment is not soon arrested, state governments might 
as well cease to exist. The dockets of our federal 
courts are crowded with cases hitherto cognizable 
by state courts. Federal officers by thousands 
swarm over the country assuming rights of espion- 
age and arrest which are repugnant to the genius 
of our government and offensive to our civiliza- 
tion.” 
Senator James W. Wadsworth of New York has 
declared: “If the tendency towards centralism of 
power in the federal government goes on, the gov- 
ernment will perish of dry rot or corruption. There 
has been built up at Washington a bureaucracy so 
vast and complicated that no one can understand 
the operations of the Government of the United 
States as it exists today and it is a bureaucracy 
which is not responsive to public sentiment. If 
we don’t call a halt some time, we will have trans- 
formed our entire structure of government; we 
will be no longer a federal union of states; we 
shall become subject to an imperial government 
with our sense of responsibility gone and democ- 
racy wiped off the map. We are whittling at the 
structure established by the fathers. If we 
whittle long enough, we shall destroy it. 
“A habit of thought has been growing during 
the last twenty years which leads people to say, 
‘Let Washington do it,” meaning the federal gov- 
ernment, when in most instances the people in their 
own community and in their own states can meet 
and solve the given problem without federal help.” 
LET EXPENDITURES BE 100% FOR GAME 
REFUGES 
As delicately as possible FOREST AND STREAM de- 
sires to call the attention to Dr. E. W. Nelson, of 
the Bureau of Biological Survey, who has been so 
active in the developing of this new Federal Bu- 
reau, to the fact that this country is provided with 
a congressional body for the making of laws and 
that this body is both responsive and responsible 
to the people. 
_To the sincere and earnest sportsmen committed 
to the passage of the Game Refuge Bill, FOREST 
AND STREAM desires to say, we agree with you 
heartily in the vital necessity for these refuges, 
but why. allow 55% of: the money collected from 
the sportsmen within your state to be diverted into 
the hands of a new Federal Bureau over which 
you have no control? Have you lost faith in your 
state? Have you lost faith in the principles of gov- 
ernment under which we have lived and prospered 
and which have conferred more benefits upon man- 
kind than any government that has ever lived? 
Why not place the money collected from the 
sportsmen within your state in the hands of the 
duly accredited officials of your state? Forget the 
new bureau that wants 55% of it for salaries and 
executive expenses. Let us spend 100% of it for 
Game Refuges. Let us forget political prejudices, 
race and creed and get together in this common 
eee to make this world a better place in which 
to live. 
To Senator Brookhart who has fathered this 
bill, and whose slogan of “Give the government 
back to the people” has been heralded so loudly 
across the land, FOREST AND STREAM desires to say, 
“Don’t give us anything, Senator, just let us keep 
what we have.” 
~O) eb) fred) 
2 ® & 
LOCAL NAMES OF BIRDS 
STUDY of the local names of American birds 
leads one to believe that our citizens delight 
to invent names for the species in which they 
take interest. In almost any region names for cer- 
tain birds can be found that are not used else- 
where. Hence it is possible to collect rather long 
lists of names for birds that attract popular atten- 
tion. For instance 92 local names are known for 
a single species of wild duck, the ruddy. In this 
case as in others some of the names have a touch 
of humor or local color that renders their study 
a constant pleasure. The ruddy duck for instance 
gets such appellations as booby, dumb-bird and 
sleepy-head because it is slow to take alarm; and 
others like hard-head, leather-breeches and shot- 
pouch because so often it safely emerges from a 
perfect rain of shot. It has various derogatory 
nicknames among the mildest of which are dinky, 
blatherskite and fool duck. 
The study of the local names of birds is not for 
interest and pleasure solely but has utility in that 
the proper local names of birds must often be used 
in legal proceedings in order to secure convictions 
by juries or even by judges for violations of bird 
protective laws. Some of the State laws especially 
refer to various birds by local names, and it is 
evident at once that it would be useless to indict 
anyone for illegal shooting of the chewink when 
the local protective law lists the bird as the joeree. 
For the use of Federal and State Wardens and 
for distribution to all interested in the general 
subject of bird names, the United States Depart- 
ment of Agriculture has published an illustrated 
and indexed catalog of more than 3,000 local 
names of migratory game birds. This publication, 
Miscellaneous Circular No. 13, treating names of 
the ducks, geese, swans, cranes, rails, shorebirds, 
dives and the bobolink may be obtained as long as 
the supply lasts, upon request addressed to the 
Office of Publications, United States Department 
of Agriculture, Washington, D. C. 
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