CHAPTER XXXII

NEED FOR A FEDERAL MIGRATORY BIRD LAW, NO-SALE-OF-GAME LAW, AND OTHERS

We are assuming that the American people sincerely desire the adequate protection and increase of bird life, for reasons that are both sentimental and commercial. Surely every good citizen dislikes to see millions of dollar's worth of national wealth foolishly wasted, and he dislikes to pay any unnecessary increased cost of living. There must be several millions of Americans who feel that way, and who are disposed to demand a complete revolution in bird protection.

There are four needs of wild bird life that are fundamental, and that can not be ignored, any more than a builder can ignore the four cornerstones of his building. Listed in the order of their importance, they are as follows:

1.--_The federal protection of all migratory birds._

2.--_The total suppression of the sale of native wild game_.

3.--_The total suppression of spring shooting and of shooting in the breeding season, and_

4.--_Long close seasons for all species that are about to be "shot out_."

If the gunners of America wish to have a gameless continent, all they need do to secure it is to oppose these principles, prevent their translation into law, and maintain the status quo. If they do this, then _all our best birds are doomed to swift destruction_. Let no man make a mistake on that point. The "open seasons" and "bag limits" of the United States to-day are just as deadly as the 5,000,000 sporting guns now in use, and the 700,000,000 annual cartridges. It is only the ignorant or the vicious who will seriously dispute this statement.

THE FEDERAL PROTECTION OF MIGRATORY BIRDS.--The bill now before Congress for the protection of all migratory birds by the national government is the most important measure ever placed before that body in behalf of wild life. A stranger to this proposition will need to pause for thought in order to grasp its full meaning, and appreciate the magnitude of its influence.

The urgent necessity for a law of this nature is due to the utter inadequacy of the laws that prevail throughout some portions of the United States concerning the slaughter and preservation of birds. Any law that is not enforced is a poor law. There is not one state in the Union, nor a single province in Canada, in which the game birds, and other birds criminally shot as game, are not being killed far faster than they are breeding, and thereby being exterminated.

Several states are financially unable to employ a force of salaried game wardens; and wherever that is true, the door to universal slaughter is wide open. Let him who questions this take Virginia as a case in point. A loyal Virginian told me only this year that in his state the warden system is an ineffective farce, and the game is not protected, because the wardens can not afford to patrol the state for nothing.

This condition prevails in a number of states, north and south, especially south. It is my belief that throughout nine-tenths of the South, the negroes and poor whites are slaughtering birds exactly as they please. It is the _permanent residents_ of the haunts of birds and game that are exterminating the wild life.

The value of the birds as destroyers of noxious insects, has been set forth in