Craig Schmidt: Yes on Measure 2

To the Editor:
As a lifelong sportsman who has been hunting all my life here in North Dakota, I am concerned about protecting our hunting heritage. That’s why I support Measure 2, which will stop the unfair and unsportsmanlike killing of captive deer and elk trapped in fenced enclosures where they have no chance to escape. The animals are tame and hand-fed, and they don’t even run from people. It’s just wrong to shoot tame animals at point-blank range, and it doesn’t represent our values here in North Dakota.

One cannot stage a dogfight on their property and claim property rights as a defense. Shooting a tame animal within a fence is just not acceptable even if it’s done on private property, and it has nothing to do with real hunting. There’s no excuse for these canned hunts, which are nothing more than the commercialization of wildlife for profit.

We need to keep the wild in wildlife, and keep the hunt in hunting. I urge my fellow sportsmen and all North Dakota citizens to vote Yes on Measure 2.
-Craig Schmidt
Minot