Recently, Pat Wray claimed that the National Rifle
Association does little for hunters (HCN, 1/23/06: What’s the NRA’s
beef with roadless areas?). He is wrong.
The NRA works
with federal, state and local legislatures and regulatory agencies
to preserve and improve hunting rights and opportunities throughout
the country. Wray acknowledged that the NRA is working to protect
Sunday hunting, pass No-Net-Hunting-Loss legislation and lower the
minimum hunting age.
But the greater part of the
NRA’s work was ignored. We led efforts to create dove-hunting
seasons in Minnesota and Michigan; we support federal legislation
that will open public hunting access on private land; we help state
wildlife agencies acquire new public hunting lands; and we are
working to guarantee that every piece of public land is open to
hunting.
Wray decries the NRA for our opposition to the
wholesale declaration of roadless areas across the West. It does
not serve the average hunter to have millions of acres of publicly
owned land to be virtually inaccessible or to have to quit hunting
earlier because hunting land is too rugged to access. Therefore,
the NRA works to ensure as many possible hunters have the most
hunting opportunities possible. Wray, conversely, wants to ensure
that the best hunting is accessible only to him and to those who
can afford it.
Dawson R.
Hobbs
National Rifle Association, Institute for
Legislative Action, Manager of Hunting Policy
Fairfax,
Virginia
(The above letter originally appeared in
Gun Week magazine, in response to Pat
Wray’s Writers on the Range column.)
This article appeared in the print edition of the magazine with the headline Roadless areas are for elitists.
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