Proposal defines hunting, fishing as a 'right'

A proposed amendment to the Montana Constitution, explicitly recognizing the rights of the state’s citizens to hunt, fish and trap, is scheduled for its first vote before the state Senate on Monday. Recalling the expensive electoral battle waged over last year’s failed ballot initiative to ban trapping on public lands, the bill would place the proposed amendment on the 2018 general election ballot.

The Senate Fish and Game Committee narrowly endorsed Senate Bill 236 last week, receiving support from Republicans and some sportsmen’s groups while Democrats and wildlife advocates lined up in opposition.

Sen. Jennifer Fielder, the Thompson Falls Republican sponsoring the bill, argues that her measure is necessary to safeguard the state’s historic ties to hunting, fishing and trapping from interest groups seeking to limit those activities.

“Some will argue that we don’t need this change, but the actions of the anti-hunting and anti-trapping movement across the country — and the cost to sportsmen and ag producers to battle frequent assaults on sound, science-based wildlife management — clearly demonstrate otherwise,” Fielder said during the Feb. 21 hearing on the bill.

Since 2010, there have been three ballot-initiative attempts to limit trapping in Montana, with last year’s Initiative 177 being the first to receive the requisite signatures for placement on the ballot. It was rejected 63-37 percent in the November general election after a campaign that attracted hundreds of thousands of dollars in spending — including substantial out-of-state spending on both sides.

Fielder significantly revised the language in her bill prior to the committee’s vote last week, after working with sportsmen’s groups who had criticized the original language as too broad and potentially limiting the state’s wildlife management authority.

Article IX, Section 7 of the state constitution currently states, “The opportunity to harvest wild fish and wild game animals is a heritage that shall forever be preserved to the individual citizens of the state and does not create a right to trespass on private property of diminution of other property rights.”

As currently written, the bill proposes replacing “opportunity” with “right,” while inserting language stating that Montanans “have the right to hunt, fish, trap and harvest wild fish and wildlife, including the use of customary means and methods.” It also includes a provision intended to secure the state’s regulatory authority to manage wildlife.

Fielder’s bill received the backing of several groups including the Montana Trappers Association, Montana Walleyes Unlimited and the Montana Wool Growers Association, all of whom framed their testimony around the recent anti-trapping initiatives during last month’s committee hearing.

“We don’t feel we can raise the money required to fight these initiative measures time and time again,” said Scott Cargill, representing the Montana State Houndsmen Association. “We don’t have the resources or the size to compete with out-of-state money and the Humane Society. … If we don’t protect our rights at this point in time, eventually it’s just going to get worse on down the line.”

Bob Gilbert, the executive director of Montana Walleyes Unlimited and a former legislator, worried that without revisions to the Section 7 language, the state’s ability to make scientifically sound wildlife management decisions will be under attack by groups “under the guise of sportsmen’s associations.”

The original bill attracted broad condemnation from state wildlife groups including Wolves of the Rockies, the Montana Wildlife Federation and Trap Free Montana Public Lands, one of the main groups pushing I-177 last year.

“I see no reason why this provision should be even thought to be put in the constitution, other than the trapping community is fearful of changing public attitudes that what they are doing is not sound for our wildlife,” Wes Miles, of Trap Free, told the committee.

Rebecca Dockter, chief legal counsel for the state Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks, called the proposed language “an attorney’s dream” that would have opened up the state to legal challenges “on almost every management action taken” by state wildlife managers.

“The Montana Constitution should be championed for its protections already enshrined in language that currently affords Montanans” those opportunities, Dockter said.

Fielder substantially amended the original language in her bill prior to the committee vote last week, scrapping much of the originally proposed language in favor of the current provisions. Because the amendment came during the panel’s executive action, debate on the new language was generally limited to the committee members considering the bill.

“This is a pretty significant change, and I’m not sure we have enough information to support your amendment and know how it’s going to affect our hunters and fishermen and trappers out in the field,” said Sen. Jill Cohenour, D-East Helena, who requested a new hearing on the bill.

Her request was denied, although Fielder, the committee chairwoman, allowed Mark Lambrecht of the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation to provide supportive testimony that the changes satisfied his concerns that led him to initially oppose to the bill.

The Senate panel voted 6-5 to approve the bill, with all Democrats voting against.

In order to appear on the 2018 general election ballot, however, the measure will need to win some bipartisan support, with the Republican majorities falling nine votes short of the minimum required for passage.

Under the Legislature’s rules for passing constitutional referendums, two-thirds of the 150 lawmakers in the House and Senate must vote for the bill for it to appear on the ballot. That means the measure would transmit to the House regardless of the upper chamber’s final vote, since the House could theoretically pass it with a unanimous vote of all 100 representatives.

Constitutional referendums passed by the Legislature do not go to the governor’s desk for approval.

Yet, even if they support the spirit of Fielder’s bill, a unified GOP is unlikely. Sen. Jeffrey Welborn of Dillon was the lone Republican on the committee to oppose the measure last week, citing his fear that anti-trapping and other groups would be strengthened if they manage to shoot down the referendum.

“Nobody has gone on the record showing us, in writing, where there’s a pot of money to get this across the finish line, and I think it’s a very dangerous precedent to not have that in place before we pass a law like this,” Wellborn told the committee. “If we lose that, the precedent we set scares me to death, and I think it should scare all Montanans to death.”

Fielder acknowledged his concerns, but argued that a vote next year would give Montanans for Wildlife and Public Access, the political committee that led the fight against I-177, a chance to build on its success in 2016.

Formed just four months before the election, that group reported raising $317,000 to fight the initiative over a four-month run-up to the election — more than twice what Montanans for Trap Free Public Lands had reported during its 16 months of campaigning and fundraising.

“Those sportsmen committees had, I think, a very frank and somber discussion over whether or not they were ready to fight another battle like that,” she said. “And they felt that the [money] they invested in the last election cycle is a foundation to go forward.”

The Senate is scheduled to hold its debate and second-reading vote on the bill during its Monday floor session, beginning at 1 p.m. A final vote will likely take place Tuesday, before it heads to the House.

Reporter Sam Wilson can be reached at 758-4407 or by email at swilson@dailyinterlake.com.