AAT TOM UATE L© {SEO GUN. COMMITTEE ON THE TERRITORIES, Houssr or REPRESENTATIVES, Thursday, March 29, 1906. The committee met at 10.30 o’clock a. m., Hon. Edward L. Hamil- ton (thairman) in the chair. : The Cuairman. The meeting of the committee was called this morning for a hearing on House bill 11949, known as the automaticgun bill. Are any gentlemen here ready to address the committee in favor of the bill ? STATEMENT OF MR. G. 0. SHIELDS, PRESIDENT OF THE LEAGUE OF AMERICAN SPORTSMEN AND SPECIAL AGENT OF THE NEW — YORK ZOOLOGICAL SOCIETY. 3 Mr. Suretps. Mr. Chairman and gentlemen, I come here to plead the cause of the birds and the wild animals. JI am not here to speak for any business or personal interest in this, but we are here to ask you to enact a law for the protection of the birds and wild animals. Mr. Luoyp. Before you proceed, give your name, residence, and occupation, and why you are here. Mr. Suietps. I am president of the League of American Sportsmen, and I live in New York City. Mr. Luoyp. You are here in the interests of that league? Mr. Surexps. In the interest of the League of American Sportsmen and of a number of other bodies, whose names will appear as we progress, in documentary evidence. I want to make a personal explanation in this connection. I want to tell you gentlemen that I have been devoting nearly all my life to the work of game preservation. JI am on record in 1878 as having petitioned the Ohio legislature to enact a law to protect the wild pigeon, and I am on record as — far back as 1872 as trying to get Congress to enact a law to protect the buffalo. I have been working in the interest of these various species of wild animals and birds from 1865, from the time I came out of the Army in the civil war, up to to-day. Of course, in the meantime I have had to make my living as I went along, but I have been in this work in the interests of wild animals and birds for nothing; have never got a cent of salary out of it; have paid my own expenses all the time, and have putin the work of the League of American Sportsmen $15,000 of my own money. That is my record in this matter, briefly. I am accused by certain gun people—I will not say whom—of doing this work against the automatic shotgun from malicious motives. It has been said; and I have letters on file that have been written to cer- tain people, trying to oppose this automatic-gun bill in various places, to the effect that I am doing this because the gun makers and