GAME LAWS. Statutes enacted either for the purpose of protecting persons in the enjoy ment of certain sporting rights, or of protecting game from improper destruction.
Previous to the Norman Conquest of England there were no restrictions against the hunting of game, except a general law prohibiting the hunting of game on Sundays; so far as is known this was the earliest game law. A subsequent law prohibited monks hunting in the woods with dogs. All other classes of society were at liberty to hunt over the country at large, except that the King's hunting was not to be interfered with; that is, wherever the King elected to hunt, all others had to vacate until the King and his fol lowers had passed. With the advent of the Nor mans in 1066, hunting became the sole privilege of the nobles, and the common people were pro hibited, under severe penalties, from the hunting of game. They enacted stringent game laws, which became known as the Forest Laws, and which frequently drove the Saxons, and com mon people generally, into rebellion. Many of them, as in the case of the historic Robin Hood, became outlaws. During the Middle Ages the game laws of England were framed so as to se cure to the landed aristocracy the exclusive right of taking game. Under their provisions, accord ing to Blackstone, "All persons of what property or distinction soever, that kill game out of their own territories, or even upon their own estates, without the King's license expressed by grant or franchise, are guilty of the offense of encroach ing on the royal prerogative. And those indigent persons who do so without having such rank or fortune, as is generally called a qualification, are guilty not only of this offense, but of the aggravations also created by the statutes for preserving game." One of the 'qualifications' for killing game in Blackstone's time was the owner ship of a freehold estate of £100 per annum, "there being fifty times the property required to enable a man to kill a partridge," remarks the great commentator, "as to vote for a Knight of the Shire." Early in the last century all the old statutes on the subject were repealed, and the Night Poaching Act, 1828 (9 Geo. IV., ch. 69),
and the Game Act, 1831 (2 Wm. IV., ch. 32), were substituted for these. These laws define game as hares, pheasants, partridges, grouse, heath or moor game, blaekgame, and bustards." Later statutes have added to the list "landrails, quail, snipe, woodcock, rabbits, and deer." These enact ments give to the occupier of land the civil reme dies of trespass and injunction against persons entering his land to kill game, or shooting into it for such purpose. They also impose criminal punishment for various violations of their pro visions, such as deer-stealing, taking of game at night, poisoning game, and the like.
In the United States game laws have been framed on different lines from those of England. Their primary object has been the protection of game itself, not the grant of exclusive rights to persons possessed of large property qualifications. In 1623 Plymouth Colony declared fowling, fish ing, and hunting to be free, except on certain private property. In 1682, in this same colony, "the law prohibiting the catching of fish before they have spawned is to be revived by the com missioners att theire next session." In 1709 it was enacted that "no wears, hedges, fish-garths, stakes, kiddies, or disturbance or encumbrance, shall be set, erected, or made on or across any river, to the stopping, obstructing, or straitening of tlig natural or usual course and passage of fish in their seasons or spring of the year." In these laws are embodied the principles which are the basis of all just and reasonable game laws, and they are the corner-stones and foundations of all the statutes for the protection of fish and game that are in force in the States and Territories to day. Class legislation is dead; all wild game and fishes are the property of him that reduces them' to possession by killing or catching, with due regard to the law of trespass on private prop erty, be it land or water; wild game and fishes must not be molested during the season of repro duction, and they must be allowed free and un obstructed passage to their breeding grounds or waters.