>Here's the problem with what you're
>saying here 440:
>
>I've been on many pack trips,
>some wilderness, some NF or
>combination thereof. I've been horseback
>on NF trails that would
>pucker your backside as much
>as any wilderness trail. So
>as it is now, the
>state of Wyo figures it's
>ok for a NR DIY
>to get his or her
>butt in a sling on
>anything but wilderness.
>
>Truth is, there are hunters who
>shouldn't be allowed in antelope
>country on their own. Don't
>kid yourself on what that
>law is about 440.
Big 10-4 on that one, jm77. I've hunted some crazy wilderness country in my home state of MT, in other states of AK, AZ, CO, NM, NV, but for some reason, the logic of this law implies I've lost my marbles when I enter a wilderness area of WY.
I would be interested in what Mightyhunter would think of some of the legal issues, based on court precedent that allows for some of this discrimination of non-residents.
One of the most relied upon cases is Baldwin v. State of Montana, a case from 1978. It went all the way to the US Supreme Court and the court issued opinions that recently have me wondering about the Baldwin case being weaker and weaker precedent for any legal defense to the WY wilderness law.
Link to the case here -
http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/436/371/case.html
In that case, MT prevailed on the topic of charging NRs 20X+ what was charged to residents. Interesting read if you want a deeper understanding of how it became that states can discriminate between R's and NR's.
In the Baldwin case, the USSC dismissed many arguments of the appellant, stating that elk hunting was not commerce, rather sport and recreation, therefore the Commerce Clauses of the Constitution did not apply.
The court also found that elk hunting was not one of the basic rights afforded protections under the Privileges and Immunity Clauses of the Constitution, and therefore the argument that their rights under the P&I Clause had been taken, did not apply.
The court also noted that the restrictions being argued, differences in pricing between MT residents and non-residents, did not interfere with any locations where a non-resident hunter could hunt any differently than what restrictions were placed on residents, thus some other parts of the P&I clauses did not pertain.
This part of the decisions is interesting -
Appellants do not -- and cannot -- contend that they are deprived of a means of a livelihood by the system or of access to any part of the State to which they may seek to travel.
Given that case was settled in 1978 and a lot has changed since then, I wonder if its validity has eroded. A couple things that make me wonder that.
Baldwin's case was determined to not be about "commerce," rather a sport, and as such the Court ruled the Commerce Clause protections of the Constitution would not apply. Since the outfitters of Wyoming are "commercial enterprises" that have placed restrictions for the benefit of their commercial operations, would the Baldwin case be less relevant to any defense Wyoming might use and make it harder for them to defend this rule now that so much commerce has entered into the activity of hunting?
Second; the USSC stated differences in allowed hunting locations of R's and NR's did not exist in the MT case, so they did not provide any opinion as to whether or not such restrictions would have resulted in a different outcome of the Baldwin case. Since the WY law does restrict where R's and NR's can hunt, does that part of the Baldwin case weaken the WY defense even further.
I'm not an attorney, but have spent twenty years researching this area of discussion and hiring qualified attorneys on some of these topics.
Mightyhunter is an attorney and definitely understands the hunting gig. I respect what he has to state on most of these issues.
Curious if he sees Wyoming eventually having weaker and weaker ground to defend the Wilderness Law, based on how hunting has become more commerce since the Baldwin case of 1978, and restrictions increase as to where R's versus NR's can hunt with the same tag.
"Hunt when you can - You're gonna' run out of health before you run out of money!"
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