By Noah Wishau, Member – WWA Policy Committee
This article originally appeared in Wisconsin Waterfowl Association’s February, 2023 Newsletter edition.
The author’s daughter participating in a WDNR banding event
The hen wood duck fell from the young girl’s hands, feet barely touching the muddy edge of the pond before taking flight for parts unknown, a brand-new band on its leg. Watching it disappear into the twilight, she turned to her father and smiled the smile that has crossed the lips of every child who has ever paused to watch a duck fly across the sky, or a deer slip through the woods, or heard the piercing thunder of a gobbler in the spring. The smile of a newly converted zealot of wild places and wild things.
That evening, the girl and her father joined other volunteers and a group of employees of the Wisconsin DNR to capture, band, and release 45 ducks. Not counted in that tally were three Black Bellied Whistling ducks that circled overhead, which were caught and banded on that same pond a few nights later. This effort was part of the larger, statewide effort which saw the banding of 764 Mourning Doves and 4,294 ducks this fall. Each and every one of these bandings were paid for by funds made available through the Pittman-Robertson Wildlife Restoration Act.
Coming just three years after the passage of the Federal Duck Stamp Act in 1934, the Pittman Robertson Act of 1937 showed that generation’s continued resolve to ensuring that future generations would enjoy hunting opportunities equal to, if not better than, those that they enjoyed. What they produced is the shining example of government getting something right, not just in terms of conservation legislation, but in any facet of life.
To properly understand just how miraculous this piece of legislation was, one must understand the conservation landscape of the 1930’s. The county was in the depths of a depression. Breadlines stretched around the block. That poverty, combined with the environmental disaster that was the Dust Bowl, created a perfect storm for wildlife across the country. Game was a cheap source of protein. Environmental considerations took a backseat to making enough money to make it through the winter. Poaching and habitat destruction caused waterfowl and other wild game populations to hit all-time lows. There is a reason that the decade is commonly called the “Dirty Thirties”.
As has happened so often in our history, out of the direst of circumstances stepped up the greatest of heroes. Men like Aldo Leopold, J.N. “Ding” Darling, and Carl Shoemaker led the movement to protect wildlife and its habitat. This movement culminated in the Pittman-Robertson Wildlife Restoration Act.
Simply stated, this act imposes an 11% manufacturer’s excise tax on long guns, ammunition, and archery equipment and a 10% tax on handguns. The money is placed into a segregated fund and distributed to the states for projects that range from duck banding and other research, to habitat restoration and management, increasing access opportunities for hunters, and funding hunter education and retention programs.
This was no blank check. To qualify for these funds, states were required to segregate the funds raised from the sales of hunting licenses and use them only for conservation purposes. In other words, hunters’ dollars must be spent on conservation.
In today’s climate, it is almost impossible to understand the reaction to this proposal. The leaders of the firearm industry, the very people that would be paying this tax, did not revolt. They did not hire an army of lobbyists to fight the proposal. They didn’t mount a public relations campaign to decry it. None of that happened. They gave it their full support.
Likewise, in an era when it seems to take Congress a year and a half to decide what color ink to use, it seems impossible that such a bill would be passed in a single year, let alone in less than 90 days. But that is exactly what happened. The Pittman-Robertson Wildlife Restoration Act was introduced in the U.S. Senate on June 20, 1937 and passed just a few weeks later on on July 7. From there it was sent to the U.S. House of Representatives where it was stuck in committee… for one month.
The call went out and public outcry forced the Congressman that chaired the committee into action. The Pittman-Robertson Wildlife Restoration Act passed the House on August 17 and was signed into law by President Roosevelt on September 2, 1937.
Within 12 months of its passage, 43 of the 48 states had enacted laws prohibiting the use of hunting license revenues for any purpose other than to operate the wildlife agency. Eventually, every state would adopt the same.
The funds generated by this act have been the backbone of success story after success story in wildlife conservation. One of the first projects undertaken with these funds in Wisconsin was the Horicon Marsh Wildlife Area. This property’s importance as a hunting area is surpassed only by its importance as habitat for all manner of waterfowl and other birds and mammals. Game populations, which had nearly collapsed during the “Dirty Thirties” soared past levels that the proponents of the bill could ever have imagined. In 1950, the Dingell- Johnson Act imposed a similar excise tax on fishing equipment to provide support for fisheries management in states across the country.
The program continues today. The duck banding project that so enamored the young girl earlier this fall was funded by just a small part of the $43.7 million that Wisconsin received in 2022 through Pittman-Robertson and Dingell-Johnson – which is part of the $1.5 billion that were distributed to states nationwide.
Everything about the Pittman-Robertson Act seems impossible. Captains of industry supporting a tax on themselves. Impossible. Government working quickly and efficiently to pass a law that would keep them from dipping into funds for pet projects elsewhere. Impossible. The stunning successes that came in the 80 years after its passage. Impossible.
Someone wanting to do away with it. Impossible. But that is exactly what has happened in each of the last two sessions of congress. In both sessions, Rep. Andrew Clyde (R-Georgia) has introduced legislation that would outlaw any excise taxes on firearms. Entitled the RETURN our Constitutional Rights Act of 2022, the bill would do away with the Pittman-Robertson Act on the grounds that it “infringes on Americans’ ability to exercise their Second Amendment rights”.
In addition to repealing Pittman-Robertson, the bill would have limited the excise tax on fishing equipment under the Dingell-Johnson Act to 3%. Because… Second Amendment… Logic was not the bill’s strong suit. Nor was it the point. The point was the ten second sound clip. “The government is taxing your guns and I’m going to stop it.” And unfortunately it works.
A couple of years ago, a friend of mine and I were discussing issues facing the conservation community. I told him that the biggest issue was that hunters don’t know what those who came before us had done to ensure that we would have the opportunities that we have today. To prove my point, I went on Facebook and proposed an 11% excise tax on firearms, the funds from which would be distributed to the states only if they showed that every dollar of hunter’s licenses went to conservation. I may have been better off proposing door to door confiscation of firearms. People who had hunted their whole lives not only didn’t recognize the proposal, they violently opposed it.
So, it came as little surprise to me when Rep. Clyde’s bill found 51 co-sponsors, including Wisconsin’s own Rep. Tom Tiffany. Just as a good duck dog can be trained to hold steady despite the duck falling just in front of it in order to earn our praise, so too have we trained our politicians to understand that they need only put on a blaze orange or camouflage hat once every couple years to earn our votes.
The time for that has passed. We owe it to those that came before to be better. And we owe it to those yet to come to be as good as those who came before.
The young girl at the beginning of this article is my daughter. I owe it to her to teach her the joy of watching a flock of mallards lock up over a spread of decoys. I owe it to her to teach her the skills she needs to see that sight. I owe it to her to teach the importance of volunteering her time and donating her money to help make sure that those ducks have habitat to live in so that one day her kids will enjoy the same opportunities. I also owe it to her to teach her of the sacrifices and the efforts of those who came before us so that we don’t give back the progress that we have made. To teach her about the systems they set up, and the causes that they championed to make sure that she can enjoy the bounty that we have today.