The Columbia herald. [volume] (Columbia, Tenn.) 18??-1935, 1909-04-30
HON. v. 7. GALLOWAY
DEFINES POSITION ON
THE CATFISH LAW
WRITES OPEN LETTER TO GEO
7. HUGHES, JR. AND OTHER
PETITIONERS.
NOT MUCH WITH HOOK AND LINE
Has Requested The Drawing Of An
Amendment to The Law-Oele-
cation Will Work For Its
Passage.

4
Passage.
In reply to a petition, sent up from
residents of Maury county, requesting
the amending of the fish laws, Repre-
sentative Galloway has written as fol
lows:
Editor of The Columbia Herald:
To Geo. T. Hughes, Jr., w. L. Hol
man and others:
Gentlemen:-Ca Lipscomb and
myself received your petition this al
ternoon Saturday, April the 24th)
and proceeded to give il our most
earnest consideration. In the petition
I it is specifically set forth that the
only fish sought by the petitioners to
be taken, and sold on the market, is
the catfish.
This is sought to be accomplished
for two purposes mentioned to-wit:
the protection of all other fish from
destruction by them, and that citizens
who do not fish may procure these
fish upon the market for their tables
Both of us are in perfect sympathy
with the desires of the petitioners.
We carefully considered this very
question in the passage of the present
fish law, as it absolutely prohibits
each of US from procuring fresh water
fish for our tables, in asmuch as ]
have caught only three fish in thirty
five years and this is about true OF
Capt. Lipscomb.
So far as we were concerned, we
wished to reflect what we believed was
the will of the majority of the county
so far as we had any expression. Inc
parties demanding that professional
fishermen should not be allowed to
take and sell fish alleged that said
fishermen, or at least the greatest part
of them when eneamped along the
river and other streams, both in their
boats and upon the banks of said
streams, when they could not be
watched or controlled, especially just
before night, engaged in unlawfully
killing fish by dynamite, as they could
hear the explosion Of the same OBJ
viously killing the fish. As matter
of fact the supply of fish has been
destroyed in the river,
which is the great fish preserve of the
A great number of men living near
the river have assured us of these
facts. and none of these farmer owners
of river lands, has ever made as yet
any statement to the contrary. Many
of these same river bank owners, have
made the additional charge that when
these professional fishermen are sta
toned, encamped, or operating in
their immediate communities, that fire.
uuent depredations are committed up
on their property of various kinds, but
they do not claim that this is the case
with all professional fishermen, but
that it does give them splendid
chance, for the evilly disposed to make
such depredations and that they have
a right to protection. In further sup |
port of their contention that the dim |
minuation of the fish supply is due to !
The professional fishermen, they point |
10 the fact that these same fishermen |
will 20 to the small streams, and be-
ing fully equipped for the purpose, do
drain these streams of all the min
nows, of every kind that have sought
protection therein, and by this means
more of the desirable minnows are
destroyed than by the catfish.
To the opinions of these men living
directly upon the river, and who have
great advantages by personal observar
ton and knowledge of the practical
of any fish law, we were
to give more consideration
than to others knowing, or caring,
very little of these things, not even
them to us.
Another item conducive to the de-
struction of catfish, in the present
law, to which l call the attention OF