RE: I agree, Utah is horrible.
>BigFin -
>
>One of your points is flat
>wrong. You state, "The states
>hold the game in trust
>for the citizens of the
>state". Would you please site
>the legal case(s) that establish
>this principle.
>
>
HornToad - Normally when someone makes a statement as bold as that which is shown above, they make sure of the points they are talking about.
Most people who know something about wildlife law in this country, the Public Trust Doctrine, and how the states came to be the trustees of wildlife, don't make such statements as you have made.
And, most who understand trust law and what trusteeship is, would not have made the following comment.
"The states have been granted stewardship of the wildlife within their borders, but that is a long way from wildlife being "owned" by the citizens of the state.
Trusteeship is different than stewardship. I don't believe I used the term ownership, but if I did, it should have been "trustee."
I see you preface your statements later on with "IMO." I would suggest that most of what you stated was made under the context of "IMO." None of what you stated is based on fact, law, or historical precedent of how wildlife came to be an asset held in trust by the states.
You and I don't have to like it, but as non-residents, that is how it is for us in this country.
So long as people continue to be uninformed/misinformed about the states trusteeship of wildlife, their fiduciary duties to their citizens, and fail to see that land ownership and wildlife opportunity have no correlation, there will continue to be non-residents who are frustrated.
Lack of understanding and the resulting frustration non-residents may have will not change the fact that Utah has a fiduciary duty to manage their wildlife resources primarily for their citizens. Us non-residents need to get over it, and realize that where ever the wildlife in UT is living, we have no claim to it, other than what the state of UT is willing to share with us.
If you really do want to learn more about this concept, I would suggest the following reading, as I stated in one of the previous posts.
Start with a Google search of "wildlife Public Trust Doctrine." Read the cases of Maritin v. Waddell, Geer v. Connecticut, Baldwin v. State of Montana, and maybe even the writings that Sax did, and Susan Horner's most recent study on the concept.
Read the USSC majority opinion on the 1842 Martin v. Waddell case. Here is the piece that established the trust notion, which goes back to the separation from England, to English Common Law, to Magna Carta, to Roman Law. This idea I stated in the post is not something I just made up. Goes back a few years before any of us were arguing about it.
----> "Whilst the fundamental principles upon which the common property in game rests have undergone no change, the development of free institutions has led to the recognition of the fact that the power or control lodged in the State, resulting from the common ownership, is to be exercised, like all other powers of government, as a trust for the benefit of all people, and not as a prerogative for the advantage of government, as distinct from the people, or for the benefit of private individuals as distinguished from the public." <-----
I suspect once you read that stuff detailing what the Public Trust Doctrine is, and that the United States Supreme Court has relied upon the Public Trust Doctrine since 1842, as the premise for establishing the states' trusteeship in wildlife, you might change that post.
From that, I fully support Utah doing whatever it feels like doing with respect to sharing wildlife with us non-residents. I sure hope to draw one of their tags someday, but that will probably not happen. Like some have said, if I don't like it, I don't need to apply.
"Hunt when you can - You're gonna' run out of health before you run out of money!"