Utahns recently voted to amend the state’s constitution to protect the right to hunt and fish in the state. Constitutional Amendment E establishes a “constitutional right to hunt and fish in Utah.”
With nearly three out of every four Utahns voting in favor of the amendment, this is certainly a win for freedom. The amendment also declares hunting and fishing as the preferred means of managing and controlling wildlife.
Utah House Rep. Casey Snider (R), who sponsored the amendment, said, “Hunting and fishing has always been a critical component of our state. … It’s a part of who we are. This bill is not only about protecting who we are, but preserving who we are going forward. … It is not unforeseeable, and history bares this out, that 30 or 40 or 50 years from now, those participating in [hunting and fishing] will be a very significant minority, more so than they already are. It is not a foregone conclusion that these sort of activities will be eliminated from the public sphere and from conservation generally and at large.”
This is an important defense of our American heritage and of rational wildlife conservation. The NRA Institute for Legislative Action (ILA) put it this way: “America’s sporting heritage is under attack like never before, by well-funded, national anti-hunting groups that want to ban all hunting, trapping and fishing. One of the ways that the NRA counters that effort is by spearheading the campaign for Right to Hunt and Fish (RTHF) state constitutional amendments. Currently, 19 states have RTHF amendments in their constitutions, protecting America’s rich outdoor heritage from well-funded efforts by national animal extremist groups to get hunting banned.”
Vermont was the first state to constitutionalize the right to hunt and fish back in 1777.
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