Some of the game laws of Washington are up to date; and her big-game laws look all right to the unaided eye, but are not.  Her bird laws are a chaotic jumble of local exceptions and special privileges.  As a net result of all her shortcomings, the remnant of a once fine fauna of big game and feathered game is surely being exterminated according to law. A few local exceptions will not disprove the general truthfulness of this assertion.

Ten years ago a few men in Seattle resented the idea of outside co-operation in the protection of Washington game.  They said they were abundantly able to take care of it; but the march of events has proven that they overestimated their capacity.  To-day the wild-life laws of that state are only half baked.  Come what may to me, I shall set down without malice the things that the great and admirable State of Washington should do to set her house in order.  It is not good for the resourceful and progressive men of the Great Northwest to be clear behind the times in these matters.

Stop local game legislation, and enact a code of laws covering the entire state, uniformly.  County legislation is twenty years behind the times!

  For ten (10) full years, stop the killing of elk, mountain sheep,
  mountain goat, caribou, moose, and antelope.  Regarding deer, I am in
  doubt.

  Prohibit the sale of all wild game, no matter where killed, by the
  enactment of a Bayne law, complete, which will also

  Promote the breeding, killing and sale of domestic game for food
  purposes.

Make a careful investigation of the present status of your sage grouse, every other grouse, quail, and all species of shore birds, then give a five-year close season, all over the state, to every species that is “becoming scarce.”  This will embrace certainly one-half of the whole number, if not two-thirds.

  Provide two bird refuges in the eastern portion of the state, where
  they are very greatly needed to supplement the good effects of the
  State Game Preserve established on Puget Sound in 1911.

  Bar the use in hunting of the odious automatic and pump shotguns
  that are now so generally in use all over the United States to the
  great detriment of the game and the people.

WEST VIRGINIA: 

Considering the fact that West Virginia contains no plague-spot city for the consumption of commercial wild game, that the sale of all game is prohibited at all times, and the game of the state may not be exported for sale elsewhere, the wild life of West Virginia is reasonably secure from the market gunner,—­if an adequate salaried warden force is provided.  Without such a force her game must continue to be destroyed in the future as in the past to supply the markets of Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, Baltimore and Washington.  The deer law is excellent, and the non-game birds, and the dove and wood-duck are perpetually protected.