Has the Republican-backed RETURN Act inspired efforts to undermine the Pittman-Robertson Act of 1937?
I warned about the bill here at Townhall and why this effort gives way to undermining true conservation in America. Now, leftist preservationists are, ironically, taking cues from the bill to repeal this seminal law.
The New York Times recently published an op-ed criticizing P.R. funds, which couples conservation funding with excise taxes collected on firearms and ammunition, for being funded by products “responsible for so much bloodshed, mayhem, fear and social division.”
“The tax is now facing a challenge, with several dozen Republicans in Congress pushing legislation that would eliminate it as an infringement on the Second Amendment,” the op-ed noted. “Eliminating it would be a good thing — but not for the benighted reasons that inspire conservative ideologues obsessed with gun rights.”
The columnist ultimately recommended repealing Pittman-Robertson, writing, “One way to get the attention of fish and game agencies, and to address the issue of funding conservation through gun sales, is to repeal the Pittman-Robertson Act. Let these agencies instead rely on direct appropriations from Congress, which will make them accountable to more than the hunting, fishing and gun interests. Then perhaps these agencies will use more of their money to protect all of the biotic communities on these landscapes, not merely game species in artificial abundance for inevitable slaughter.”
The article cited a paper published in Conservation & Society entitled “Violent Entanglements: The Pittman-Robertson Act, Firearms, and the Financing of Conservation.” It suggests decoupling conservation funding from guns and ammunition and argues, “The deepening dependence of conservation funding on firearms sales only reaffirms this historic bond between violence, racism, and lands and wildlife management.”
Its conclusion reads like this: “As a matter of ethics and democracy, this shifting relationship between conservation and firearms demands that conservationists consider how this model benefits from social violence, reproduces gun users, and prioritises a narrow set of wildlife users. As a practical matter, addressing the entanglement of conservation and guns requires identifying new sources of revenue for conservation, but also a re-evaluation of NAM and the public trust doctrine. Until such a shift is made, any efforts to address gun safety in the United States may have unintended consequences for conservation activities and may create perverse incentives for conservation organisations to act in the interest of gun manufacturing.”
As a result, preservationist environmental organizations feel emboldened to interfere with conservation practices. How so? The anti-hunting organization Center for Biological Diversity - along with the Humane Society of the United States - is currently petitioning the Department of Interior and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to stop distributing Pittman-Robertson funds to Idaho and Montana because they permit wolf management.
“DOI and FWS should disqualify Idaho and Montana from such conservation funds because they have passed legislation creating anti-predator wildlife management programs aimed at drastically reducing their ecologically important wolf populations,” the petition said. “Petitioners value wolves and work to oppose anti-predator policies, and we thus qualify as “interested person[s]” under the [Administrative Procedure Act] APA. For the reasons set forth in this Petition and as a matter of law, we ask that DOI and FWS promptly respond to this Petition and determine whether Idaho and Montana, based on their new laws aimed at decimating their wolf populations, should now be ineligible for Pittman-Robertson Act funding.”
Much to CBD’s chagrin, wolf management falls perfectly in line with the North American Model of Wildlife Conservation. Furthermore, their misinformation about the wolf’s status in Montana —and at the federal level—can be easily debunked.
Last month, the Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife, and Parks (FWP) announced 2021 wolf numbers remained constant in the Treasure State — even with its highly-regulated wolf hunt.
The Daily Montanan reports the wolf population is “very stable.”
“What the data shows us really isn’t surprising,” FWP Director Hank Worsech said in a press release. “Our management of wolves, including ample hunting and trapping opportunities, have kept numbers at a relatively stable level during the past several years.”
The Pittman-Robertson Act is a wildly successful law that shouldn’t be reimagined.
Last year, $1.5 billion in conservation funding was distributed back to all 50 U.S. states for habitat restoration, wildlife conservation, public shooting ranges, and hunters education. Since 1937, $15 billion has been generated in conservation funding. That’s a win for America’s sportsmen and women—who largely identify as conservatives and Republicans.
I’m reliably told if Republicans retake Congress, the RETURN Act won’t advance. As Republican cosponsors learn more about the bill, they soon drop support as seven original co-sponsors just did.
Should they retake Congress this November, the GOP has an immense opportunity to lead on public policy — including conservation. Instead of giving the Left ammunition to destroy Pittman-Robertson, they should abandon the RETURN Act and focus on actual true conservation legislation.