Duck stamps and the Dingell-Johnson Act, conservation the sportsman paid for

Here is a sentence you will almost never hear in a Washington hearing room: "We would like to be taxed more, please." Tax increases are generally proposed by people who will not pay them, and are accepted by people who would rather not. The exceptions are rare enough to be worth a close look.

One of them is the American sportsman. Twice in the twentieth century, hunters and anglers walked into Congress and asked for a tax on themselves, on the explicit condition that the money go to wildlife and not into the general treasury. They got it. The result was one of the most successful conservation programs in history, funded by people who loved the outdoors enough to pay for it, and not by the taxpayer at large. I want to tell the story, because it is a case study in how a free people can solve a public problem without waiting to be told.

The problem: the empty marsh

Start in the 1930s. America's wetlands were being drained for farmland and development at a rapid rate, and the drought of the Dust Bowl years dried many of those that remained. Waterfowl, ducks and geese in the great flyways of the continent, were in trouble. Habitat was shrinking and the hunting seasons were long. Sportsmen were among the first to see it, because they were the ones standing in empty marshes with a full license and nothing to shoot.

There were conservation laws on the books by then. Theodore Roosevelt had created the first federal wildlife refuge, at Pelican Island, Florida, by executive order in 1903. The Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918 regulated the taking of migratory birds, and the Migratory Bird Conservation Act of 1929 provided for the purchase of refuge land. But the money to buy the land was lacking. The Treasury had a great many calls on it, and wetlands were not near the top.

The Migratory Bird Hunting Stamp Act of 1934

The answer was a stamp. On March 16, 1934, President Franklin Roosevelt signed the Migratory Bird Hunting Stamp Act, which is usually called the Duck Stamp Act. Under the law, waterfowl hunters above a set age must buy a federal migratory bird hunting stamp and carry it, with a state license, when they hunt. The first stamp cost one dollar.

Here is the clever part. The law directed that the money from the stamp go into a special fund, now called the Migratory Bird Conservation Fund, and that it be used to acquire wetlands and other habitat for the National Wildlife Refuge System. The Fish and Wildlife Service has said that nearly all of each stamp dollar goes to buy or lease habitat, with a small share covering printing and administration; check its website for the current figure. The hunters were not paying a fee to enter the marsh; they were paying to have a marsh to enter.

The first stamp's design came from a man whose name belongs on any list of American conservationists: Jay N. "Ding" Darling. Darling was a political cartoonist for the Des Moines Register, a Republican and a sportsman who won the Pulitzer Prize for editorial cartooning in 1924 and again in 1943. In 1934, the year the stamp act passed, he became head of the Bureau of Biological Survey, a predecessor of the Fish and Wildlife Service. He designed the first stamp himself, and he held the post only briefly, but it was enough to put the stamp on the road. The stamp has been an art form ever since: a contest each year selects a design, and collectors buy the stamps for their beauty.

What the money bought

The cumulative result is remarkable. Federal duck stamp sales have helped buy or lease millions of acres of wetlands and other habitat, much of it in the National Wildlife Refuge System; as of 2024 the stamp had funded more than 2.6 million acres at 264 refuges. Many of the refuges where Americans now watch migrating birds, whether or not they hunt, exist because of the dollars of hunters.

The stamp also serves as a free pass to national wildlife refuges that charge an entrance fee, which makes the program a bargain for anyone who visits. A bird-watcher can buy a stamp too, and many do, because they want to support the cause or the artwork. Congress has raised the price of the stamp over the years, and the amount you should pay today is on the Fish and Wildlife Service's website.

I should add a note about credit. Ducks Unlimited is a private conservation group of waterfowl hunters that raises money from members to protect habitat. The two efforts are different but they share a spirit: hunters organizing to protect the resource they use, without being asked.

The principle: user pays

Let me state the principle at the heart of the story, because it is the part with the widest application. In economics and in common sense, the question of who should pay for a public good has two plausible answers. One is everyone: pay out of general taxes, and spread the cost. The other is the people who benefit most directly: pay through a user fee or an excise tax on what they buy.

The user-pay model has several virtues, and conservatives have always had a soft spot for them.

1. It is fair. The person who benefits pays. The family that never touches a fishing rod does not subsidize a boat ramp.

1. It is accountable. A fee that goes into a dedicated fund, for a defined purpose, is harder for a legislature to raid than a general appropriation. The sportsmen who pay the money are watching to see that it goes where it was promised.

1. It aligns incentives. The people who pay are the ones who care about the outcome, and they will tell you when the program is wasting their money.

1. It does not require a new bureaucracy. The money is collected through existing channels, such as license sales and excise taxes at the manufacturer level, and spent through agencies that already exist.

1. It is voluntary in spirit. The sportsmen asked for the tax. They were not conscripted.

Pittman-Robertson, 1937

The duck stamp was the first step, but the model went further. In 1937, three years later, Congress passed the Federal Aid in Wildlife Restoration Act, usually called the Pittman-Robertson Act after its sponsors, Senator Key Pittman of Nevada and Representative Absalom Willis Robertson of Virginia. It imposed an excise tax on firearms and ammunition, and the proceeds are distributed to the states for wildlife restoration, hunter education and the acquisition and management of habitat. Hunters and the firearms industry supported it. Here, in other words, is a tax on a product that the gun industry and its customers asked Congress to impose on themselves, to pay for the animals the products are used to pursue. It is worth keeping in mind in any conversation about whether the firearms industry cares about anything but sales.

The Dingell-Johnson Act, 1950

Anglers noticed the success, and they wanted the same for fish. In 1950, Congress passed the Federal Aid in Sport Fish Restoration Act, known as the Dingell-Johnson Act after its sponsors, Representative John D. Dingell Sr. of Michigan and Senator Edwin C. Johnson of Colorado. It placed an excise tax on certain fishing equipment, paid at the manufacturing level, and sent the proceeds to the states for fisheries management, habitat restoration, stocking, research and public access to the water.

The structure is the same as Pittman-Robertson. The money is collected from the people who buy the equipment, it goes into a dedicated fund, and it is apportioned to state fish and wildlife agencies, which match the federal dollars with their own, in part from fishing license fees. The states decide, within the law, where the money is best spent, which means that decisions are made closer to the water than to Washington.

Wallop-Breaux, 1984

In 1984, Congress expanded the program. The Wallop-Breaux amendments, named for Senator Malcolm Wallop of Wyoming and Representative John Breaux of Louisiana, widened the base of taxes that fund the Sport Fish Restoration program. They extended the excise tax to nearly all sportfishing equipment, added import duties on recreational boats, and directed to the program a share of the federal tax on motorboat fuel. The change increased the money available. The reasoning was that boaters, who use the water, should contribute to its upkeep.

The pattern of the whole story is that the sportsmen kept asking for more, and the user-pay system kept delivering results.

A fair objection: is it enough?

The best objection to a user-pay model is not that it fails, but that it is incomplete. Some say that the hunters and anglers who have paid for conservation represent a shrinking share of the population, and that the benefits of habitat go to everyone, including people who do not hunt or fish. If the benefits are broad, the argument goes, the funding should be broad as well. A model that depends on a declining number of hunters, it is said, may not be sustainable.

That deserves a serious answer, and I have three parts to it.

First, the point about declining participation is a real concern, and many state wildlife agencies, hunters and shooting-sports groups have worked to recruit new hunters and anglers, partly for that reason. The goal is to keep the base of the user-pay system healthy.

Second, there is nothing stopping non-hunters from contributing, and many do. Bird-watchers buy duck stamps. People who love the outdoors give to land trusts and conservation groups and buy entry passes to refuges. A voluntary contribution has a value the general taxpayer's does not: it shows that the giver cares.

Third, and here I will take a position, a proposal to fund wildlife management from general taxes asks a question that the user-pay model never has to answer: why should a taxpayer in a city with no marsh pay for it, and why should the budget of a wildlife program depend on the competing claims on a general fund? Congress has considered proposals to add general funding for wildlife programs, and the arguments are serious on both sides. What I insist on is that those who propose to spread the cost should explain why the user-pay system, with its record, needs to be supplemented, and how to do it without losing the accountability the dedicated funds provide.

The contrast

There is an uncomfortable contrast, and I will state it plainly and fairly. Hunters and anglers, who are a minority of Americans, have paid for much of the habitat that the whole country enjoys, through taxes they asked for. Some organizations that campaign against hunting have raised large sums for advocacy and litigation, and some conservation groups that do not hunt, such as the land trusts that buy and protect private land, have made major contributions to habitat. But the claim that people who oppose hunting should have a larger say in how wildlife is managed than the people who paid for it is a hard one to defend. The legitimate question is not who is virtuous but who is paying, and who has a stake.

I would put it this way. Conservation is not a matter of sentiment. It requires money, land, science and the work of people who know the animals. If you care about ducks and trout, the best thing you can do is to give, to support the stamp, to join a conservation group, and to vote for people who respect the programs that work. The sportsmen who wrote the check in 1934 and 1950 did all of those, and the least the rest of us can do is to say thank you.

The Founding angle

The Founders did not write about duck stamps, but they did write about the relationship between a free people and the land. In the Declaration, they claimed rights to "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness," and in the Constitution they gave Congress the power to regulate commerce among the states and to "make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper." The Migratory Bird Treaty Act of 1918 relied on the treaty power, and the Supreme Court upheld it in Missouri v. Holland (1920), a case still studied for its reading of the treaty power.

But the better lesson is about self-government. A free people does not have to wait for the government to solve every problem. Where a problem can be solved by those who care about it, through voluntary association and fair taxation of the beneficiary, the solution is often better and more durable than one imposed from above. That is the spirit of the old American habit of forming a society for the common good, which Tocqueville noticed in the 1830s. The duck stamp is an American idea.

For related reading, see Annie Oakley, the Ohio sharpshooter who wanted every woman to learn to shoot, which tells of the hunting tradition from another angle, and Why gun makers are not sued for crimes, the 2005 law and the Mexico case, on the legal climate of the industry that helps fund Pittman-Robertson. Federalism Lets Fifty States Experiment, and the Constitution Planned It explains why the state-run model of these programs works, and What Commerce Among the Several States Meant to the Men Who Wrote It covers the clause behind federal wildlife law. You can look up your own officials at the my-representatives page.

The case in brief

1. The Migratory Bird Hunting Stamp Act of March 16, 1934 required waterfowl hunters to buy a federal stamp, with nearly all the proceeds going to buy habitat for the National Wildlife Refuge System.
2. Jay "Ding" Darling, the cartoonist and conservationist who headed the Biological Survey, designed the first stamp.
3. Pittman-Robertson (1937) taxed firearms and ammunition for wildlife restoration, and the Dingell-Johnson Act (1950) taxed fishing tackle for fisheries, both at the request of the sportsmen who pay.
4. Wallop-Breaux (1984) widened the Dingell-Johnson tax base to more gear, boat imports and motorboat fuel, which increased the funding.
5. The user-pay model is fair, accountable and aligned with the people who care, and any broader funding should preserve those virtues.

What you can do: if you hunt or fish, buy the licenses and stamps you need and join a local conservation group; if you do not, buy a duck stamp this year and tell your representative that you support the user-pay programs.