By John Howard

Eric Washburn’s recent column warns Coloradans the right to hunt and fish amendment is a Trojan horse designed to resurrect “cruel” practices voters have already banned and to elevate killing above every other form of wildlife management. The argument is passionate. It is also wrong on the text, the history, the experience of other states and the practical stakes in Colorado.

Look first at the actual language of the right to hunt and fish amendment. It creates a right of the people of Colorado to hunt, fish and take fish and wildlife — including by traditional methods — for species managed by the state, with explicit exclusions for nongame species, endangered species and anything illegal under federal law.

Critically, it states the section does not limit the authority of Colorado Parks and Wildlife or the General Assembly to regulate hunting, fishing and wildlife management when the regulation is necessary for sound scientific conservation and management, public safety or to preserve future hunting and fishing opportunities. It does not authorize trespass. It does not repeal existing constitutional bans.

The 1996 voter-approved constitutional prohibition on leghold traps, snares and certain other devices remains untouched — and will remain solidly in place after Coloradans pass the right to hunt and fish this fall. Spring bear hunting, bear baiting and hound hunting of bears — restricted by voters in1992 — are not restored by this measure.

“Traditional methods,” as used in the amendment, simply refers to the lawful methods Coloradans already use: archery, muzzleloaders, rod and reel.

It is not a secret code for every practice ever employed in human history.

Twelve states already have “traditional methods” language in their constitutions including Utah. None of them have rolled back previously banned practices like Washburn suggests. Courts and agencies in those states have not treated the provisions as automatic nullification of prior ethical or scientific restrictions. The same regulatory carve-outs that appear in Colorado’s proposed amendment have preserved existing bans while shielding the core activity from elimination.

Why amend the constitution at all if hunting and fishing are currently legal? Because legality is not permanence. Colorado has seen repeated legislative, commission and ballot-box efforts — 22 by last count — to restrict or phase out hunting, fishing and science-based wildlife management.

These attempts have come under the current Polis administration, including through appointments that hunting and conservation groups have consistently criticized as tilting the Parks and Wildlife Commission away from the North American Model.

Washburn is a close personal friend and ally of Gov. Jared Polis. His column is an attempt to spin away from Polis’ abysmal record on the true conservation that funds the agency and sustains the landscapes both hunters and anglers and those that do not hunt or fish value.

The North American Model — public ownership of wildlife, regulated take, science-based management and funding largely supplied by hunters and anglers through licenses and excise taxes — has recovered species and sustained populations for more than a century.

These facts remain undisputed, sportsmen and women provide the majority of Colorado Parks and Wildlife’s funding. Their activities generate billions in economic activity and tens of thousands of jobs.

Declaring hunting and fishing the preferred means of managing populations simply reflects that reality: regulated harvest remains the most practical, self-funding and widely proven tool for responsibly managing populations of game species while generating the revenue that pays for habitat work, research and nongame programs.

Washburn correctly notes that responsible management includes habitat investment, nonlethal coexistence, vaccines and relocation. Nothing in the amendment forbids any of those tools. Again, the biologists and science will continue to manage those practices when the amendment passes.

It prioritizes hunting and fishing as primary where they are effective, not exclusive.

The alternative vision — treating harvest as a last resort or moral embarrassment — risks undercutting the very constituency that has financed conservation for generations in Colorado.

When populations of deer, elk or other managed species exceed habitat capacity or create conflicts, science-based seasons and bag limits are not “cruel free-for-alls.” They are the system that has worked. And as a self-proclaimed hunter, Mr. Washburn should know that.

The right to hunt and fish amendment will shut down the repeated attempts to erase this heritage by rogue politicians and provide constitutional clarity that the people of Colorado want it continued, not eroded through successive administrative or ballot campaigns.

Public support for ethical, regulated hunting remains strong when it is presented honestly as part of conservation and a source of millions of meals for Colorado families. Constitutional protection in 24 other states has not produced the chaos Washburn describes. It has provided a stable, responsible and science-based management system that works for both hunters and anglers and those who do not participate.

Coloradans can and will continue to debate methods and seasons through the Parks and Wildlife Commission, the legislature and future initiatives. That democratic process is preserved and will continue under the amendment.

What the amendment does is prevent the core activity itself from being treated as a changeable option on the political leanings of any given administration.

Families fishing a high-country stream or hunters pursuing elk under fair-chase rules are not engaging in fringe cruelty. They are participating in a tradition that funds the agency and sustains the landscapes we all share.

The right to hunt and fish does not require romantic advertising to justify itself. It requires only that Coloradans recognize a successful, science-backed system when they see it — and protect it before the next attempt to end it, ban it or in the case of Oregon, criminalize it.

John Howard is a two-term former chairman of the Colorado Parks and Wildlife Commission, and an avid hunter and angler, who has been an integral part of shaping wildlife policy. He’s a member of the Colorado Wildlife Conservation Project and Backcountry Hunters & Anglers and resides in Grand Junction.