The Montgomery tribune. (Montgomery City, Mo.) 1892-1910, 1910-06-10
TOLERTON WILL
PROTECT GAME
LATE COURT RULINGS ARE NOT
ACCEPTED BY THE MISSOURI
GAME COMMISSIONER.
New Game and Fish Law Is Opposed
But Successfully Operated by Toll
erton and HE Deputies-WiH
Continue to Prosecute.

looked upon with favor by the people
who have for a life time hunted and
tished without let or hindrance. This
is especially true of men who live in
regions where game and fish abound
and where they can spend a few
hours any day with gun, rod OF seine
and procure animal food enough for
their families without drawing on the
reserve stock of bacon or paying tri-
butte to the beef trust.
Missouri having always been a par
adise for hunters and fishermen, game
and fish laws have had hard sailing
in our legislative halls and harder
experience in the fields and forests
and along the streams when in con-
tact with men who feel that they
have a natural right to all the game
they ear kill and all the fish they
can catch. Yet Missouri today has
one of the best of the many game and
fish laws enacted by state legisla-
lures in late years. This could not
be said of the law enacted by a
Democratic legislature in 1907, how
ONNl " lht otalutS hCh SlNCh ths
state by Democratic solons can only
be described as a monstrosity. 1t
was one of the crudest of all So
called game and fish laws and was a
joke in the courts and among sports.
men as long as it was on the books.
The present statute was enacted in
1909, originating in the House, where
all of its best features were created
and where it was protected from
damaging amendments approved by
the Senate. 1t provides for a State
Game and Fish Commissioner, who
may appoint n or more deputy com
mlssioners in each Congressional dis
trict, clothed with authority to make
arrests and to destroy nets, seines
and other apparatus used Illegally in
taking fish, and to confiscate fish and
game unlawfully taken or shipped.
mus the deputies are feared by those
who would not fear molestation by To-
cal peace officers and they have been
able to make game and fish laws eff.
fective.
But the revenue necessary to oper-
ate the law must come from hunters
licenses and the penalties paid by
violators of the law. NO man can
hunt protected game without a IL
cense on any premises not his own,
Or leased or tenanted by him, and
non-residents must pay a liberal Ii
cense fee to hunt anywhere in the
state. The point in the law, there.
fore, which can be attacked most dan
gerously is the license provision. If
that can be broken down and land
owners and lesses may privilege hunt
lng on their premises without license
the revenue will be impaired and the
operation of the law made ineffective.
Late rulings by circuit judges-notab.
ly by Judges Evans and Woodside in
southern districts-threaten trouble
in the collection of license fees. Their
Interpretation of the law seems to be
that no license is necessary to hunt
game not protected under the game
law, or to hunt any kind of game in
the neighborhood of ones home dur.
ing the open season"-the period
when the destruction Of such game is
not prohibited; and that a person
who is the owner, lessee or tenant
Tor the minor child of such owner,
lessee or tenant) can hunt without a
license on lands under his control or
ON adjacent lands with permission.
Section 81 of the law restricts hunting
without license to lands used ex'
clusively for agricultural purposes"
Mr.. Jesse A. Tolerton, State Game
and Fish Commissioner, has put an
altogether different construction or
the law, under the best legal advice
and will not accept as conclusive the
doctrine laid down aby the judges re
ferred to. In a recent letter to Johr
B. Scott of Rolla, Mr.. Tolerton said
referring to a ruling of Judge Wood
side: II haxe no h~esitancy in saying
that (if he is correctly quoted) sucf
is not the law and was not so in
tended by the trainers of the bill mol
the legislature that passed 1t. 1t II
my intention to go right down thu
line prosecuting any and all case!
where there are fragrant violations o
the game laws as i understand them
Soon or late / expect to see this ques
tion of who should be construed
hunter passed upon by the highe'
courts, and l have no fear of the re
suits when we get a decision. o
course it may take some time Il
reach the higher courts with some o
these cases, but it is not my inten
tion to stop the work on such con
Struction of the law as Judge Wood
side has announced"
Mr.. Tolerton has SO far made tn
Game and Fish Department of tn
State Government potent in the pre-
lection and propagation of game an
fish and has done much to breal
down a lingering prejudice agains
such laws as must be enforced t
$1,000, &h> ovsraktn- - onfrnaIc