About the Opposition
Several ways in which the opposition tries to mislead Michiganders about Proposal 3:1. The opposition: "Those pushing for a no vote on Proposal 3 are out-of-state activists."
The truth: The Committee to Keep Doves Protected includes avid hunters, biologists, bird hobbyists, concerned citizens, environmentalists, farmers, children, legislators, religious groups, ornithologists, professors, wildlife rehabilitators, and animal welfare advocates who have one common goal: to keep doves protected. The referendum is a direct response to one single measure that was passed by the legislature, and does not address any other hunting issues. This issue is driven by Michiganders, as evidenced by the nearly 5,000 Michigan volunteers who gathered signatures, and more than 275,000 Michigan voters who signed petitions to place this referendum on the ballot.
2. The opposition: “Shooting doves is good wildlife management.”
The truth: Doves are not overpopulated and do not cause any nuisance problems, so shooting them serves no management purpose. Other states with long-standing policies of protecting doves do not have management problems either. The Michigan Audubon Society, the state’s oldest conservation organization, and the Michigan State Grange, the state’s oldest farming organization, have both endorsed the NO on Proposal 3 campaign. Furthermore, this is not just an issue of science and populations, but an issue of Michigan tradition and values.
3. The opposition: “The mourning dove is the most popular game bird in America.”
The truth: While it’s true that more mourning doves are killed nationwide than other upland birds, doves shooting is not popular among hunters. Dove hunting is not economically significant compared with other hunting activities. There are more than 750,000 licensed hunters in Michigan, but the YES on Proposal 3 campaign has stated that only 10,000 people would hunt doves. In other words, only 1.3 percent of Michigan’s hunters would even participate in a dove season. (Less than a third of that number, 3,068 hunters, participated in Michigan’s “trial” dove hunt in 2004.)
According to a report entitled, “The Economic Importance of Hunting in America,” hunting of migratory bird species in total (which includes ducks, geese and doves) totaled $1.4 billion in economic impact nationwide, compared with $1.8 billion by small game hunters and $10.1 billion by big game hunters. Hunters spend far fewer hunter days pursuing doves than any other hunted species (only 3.4 days per dove hunter on average, compared with 9 for quail, grouse and turkey and 13 for deer). Nationwide, mourning dove hunting participation – not just in terms of the number of hunters, but also the number of days spent hunting and the number of birds harvested – has declined since 2000.
4. The opposition: "They had to pay petition gatherers to get the number of signatures required to get Proposal 3 on the ballot.”
The truth: Five thousand unpaid Michigan volunteers gathered 225,000 signatures of Michigan voters. This was well more than enough signatures to place the petition on the ballot. The Committee did pay a professional signature gathering firm to collect 50,000 additional signatures to ensure that dirty tactics from dove shooting proponents, such as mailing in phony petitions and challenging valid petitions in court, did not prevent Proposal 3 from making the ballot. challenging valid petitions in court, did not prevent Proposal 3 from making the ballot.
5. The opposition: “Michigan’s economy will benefit from a dove shooting season.”
The truth: A recent report concluded that Michigan’s economy will not benefit from a dove season, and in fact may be harmed. See how the opposition's own economic impact figures have taken a dramatic downward spiral (PDF). Dove shooting is a low cost activity that will substitute for other activities and people will not come from out of state to shoot doves.The multi-billion dollar wildlife watching and feeding industry may be threatened since doves are among the most popular birds to watch. And the state budget loses money running a dove season - non-hunting taxpayers will pick up the season’s tab. Wouldn’t our tax dollars be better spent on more important things like education and job creation?
6. The opposition: "Failure of Proposal 3 is a step toward efforts to ending all hunting in Michigan."
The truth: We respect Michigan’s hunting heritage—this campaign is all about the doves. The Committee to Protect Doves is a grassroots group of Michigan citizens and organizations that respect Michigan’s hunting heritage. The group has only one goal: to encourage Michigan voters to vote NO on Proposal 3 to continue Michigan’s 100-year tradition of protecting mourning doves. Proposal 3 does not address any other issues. Keeping doves protected, a policy that has been the status quo for 100 years, will not affect any other types of hunting. Michigan is one of the biggest hunting states in the country, and hunting has thrived here for a century without the shooting of mourning doves.
7. The opposition: “The Vote No on Proposal 3 campaign is being bankrolled by out-of state groups.”
The truth: The Committee to Keep Doves Protected is a grassroots group of Michigan citizens and organization. Over 97 percent of individual contributors to the NO on Proposal 3 campaign are Michigan residents. Michigan organizations like the Michigan Humane Society have contributed to the effort to keep doves protected. Some national groups like The Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) are also supporting the NO on Proposal 3 campaign. The HSUS has more than 300,000 Michigan members, and these Michigan residents want to keep doves protected. For every person who hunted mourning doves in Michigan last year, The HSUS has 100 Michigan members.
On the other hand, five out-of-state groups—the Virginia-based National Rifle Association, the Ohio-based U.S. Sportsmen’s Alliance, the Arizona-based Safari Club International, the Virginia-based Ballot Issues Coalition, and the South Carolina-based National Wild Turkey Federation, have contributed hundreds of thousands of dollars totaling 68% of all funds to the YES on Proposal 3 campaign. They claim they are working to raise over $3.3 million to end Michigan’s 100-year tradition of protecting doves.
8. Opposition: “Michigan sportsmen contribute more than $2 billion dollars (sic) per year to Michigan's economy, and support 33,000 jobs."
The truth: Michigan sportsmen as a whole may contribute to the economy, but that doesn’t mean dove hunting would. Their numbers are all over the place. At the start of the campaign, the National Rifle Association estimated that dove hunting would generate $87 million of annual economic impact for Michigan. The Michigan Coalition for Responsible Gun Owners claimed $100 million. Then in early October the National Shooting Sports Foundation said it was more like $18 million. Most recently, the Director of the Michigan DNR said a dove season would generate $5.9 million. And then at the other end of the spectrum, the YES on Proposal 3 campaign is claiming the economic impact generated by all fishing, hunting and wildlife watching recreation in the state to balloon their figures and mislead voters.
Wildlife watchers in Michigan outnumber hunters by 3 to 2 and spend significantly more money on related trips and equipment ($693 million compared to $490 million).
Activities in Michigan by US Residents |
Anglers |
Hunters |
Wildlife Watchers |
Trip & equipment expenditures |
$839 million |
$490 million |
$693 million |
Participants |
1,354,000 |
754,000 |
2,666,000 |
Source: U.S. Department of the Interior, Fish and Wildlife Service and U.S. Department of Commerce, U.S. Census Bureau. 2001 National Survey of Fishing, Hunting, and Wildlife-Associated Recreation – Michigan State Report, p. 5.
9. Opposition: “Mourning doves are hunting in 40 other states, so we should hunt them here in Michigan too.”
The truth: Michigan should do what's right for Michigan, not for other states. The best guide as to what's right for Michigan is the tradition of protecting mourning doves in the state for 100 years. There have been opportunities every year in the last century for legislators to allow the sport shooting of mourning doves, and they have always resisted those opportunities until once in 2004.
10. Opposition: “Mourning doves are plentiful and hunting them will not harm their population.”
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service reports the mourning dove population to be in “significant decline” over the last 41 years. Researchers have also noted "dove populations from groups of non-hunting states in the Northeast and Upper Mideast have much higher annual survival rates." Michigan harbors less than one percent of the total estimated population of mourning doves and does not see large migrations from Canada.
But the truth: This is not just an issue of science and populations, but an issue of social values. The question is not can we hunt mourning doves, but should we hunt mourning doves. We could hunt bluejays, robins, cardinals, and many other birds without endangering their populations, but we have decided as a society that shooting those songbirds for sport is inappropriate. Michigan's social values had protected mourning doves for 100 years, and the state's voters will now have a chance to decide what is most appropriate.
11. Opposition: “There is a group of extremists trying to change our way of life and restrict our freedoms.”
The truth: Doves have been protected for 100 years in Michigan. It is actually a YES vote on Proposal 3 that would change Michigan tradition and “our way of life.” A NO vote on Proposal 3 is not a vote for restricting any “freedoms” presently enjoyed, but is simply a vote for maintaining the status quo.
12. Opposition: “Proposal 3 is not just about doves, it’s about our rights.”
The truth: Proposal 3 is just about doves. A simple reading of the ballot language demonstrates that. Proposal 3 is a proposal to create a new dove shooting season in Michigan: a YES vote will create the season, and a NO vote will keep doves protected. It’s as simple as that. If voters want to approve a dove shooting season they have every right to do so, but they should not be misled into thinking that Proposal 3 is about anything other than doves.
The proponents of Proposal 3 know they are behind in the polls (66% NO to 25% YES, EPIC-MRA, 10/26/06) and cannot win by arguing the merits of what Proposal 3 is actually about—creating a new dove shooting season. So, they are attempting to mislead and scare voters by claiming that Proposal 3 is about something besides dove shooting, which it is not. The YES on Proposal 3 campaign ad on statewide radio mentions doves only once—to say that Proposal 3 is not about doves.
13. Opposition: “The group funding the opposition to Proposal 3 admits they want to stop all hunting.” And: “Proposal 3 is the first step to a total ban on hunting.”
The truth: This effort has nothing to do with other forms of hunting, and the hypothesis that retaining a ban on dove hunting is a first step to ban other forms of hunting is without foundation and is little more than fear mongering. “The group” to which the YES campaign’s radio ad refers is The Humane Society of the United States (HSUS), which has 300,000 Michigan members. The HSUS is not opposed to all hunting, but rather works to end the most cruel abuses of hunting like canned hunts (where animals are shot in fenced-in areas) and Internet hunting (controlling a gun with computer mouse and killing animals over the Internet, which even the National Rifle Association and Michigan United Conservation Clubs, both leaders of the YES on 3 campaign, opposed, and the Michigan Legislature has outlawed).
And while The HSUS is the largest organizational contributor of the Committee to Keep Doves Protected, they are hardly the only one. The Committee also received donations from the Michigan Humane Society, the Michigan Audubon Society, and other organizations and local businesses. The Committee also received almost 7,000 contributions from individual Michigan citizens; 97% of all individual contributions were from Michiganders. The YES on 3 campaign received a few dozen donations total, many from out-of-state organizations.
14. Opposition: “The same group of extremists would ban animal research used to find cures for deadly diseases like cancer and heart disease.” And: “After using its wealth for unsuccessful attempts to end fishing and dog breeding, halt the ‘breakfast of cruelty’ (bacon and eggs), close marine aquariums, protest leather, stop circus acts and end all animal research including for SIDS and AIDS, the Humane Society of the United States decided dove hunting in Michigan was an easy target.”
The truth: Again, Proposal 3 is only about doves. As far as we know, doves are not used in animal research, do not perform in circus acts, are not used for dove leather, and provide much less meat than bacon and eggs.
Moreover, it’s a gross misrepresentation of The HSUS’s policies. On the subject of animal research, The HSUS believes in “the three Rs: reduce, refine and replace.” They work with scientists to help reduce pain and distress to animals in laboratories, and to develop new alternatives to animal testing when possible. They are not out to stop animal testing, but simply want to reduce suffering for animals used in testing and find equally effective alternatives if possible, a very reasonable and laudable goal. On the subject of farming, The HSUS works with producers to raise animals more humanely and to ensure humane slaughter, even training farmers on handling and slaughter techniques. The HSUS has no positions on leather or fishing. The group encourages spaying and neutering of dogs, works to shut down abusive “puppy mills,” and rescued more than 10,000 pets during Hurricane Katrina.
15. Opposition: “Protect your rights and protect your family.”
The truth: This is laughable. No one’s rights, and certainly no one’s family, are in danger if the people of Michigan decide to continue our state’s 100-year tradition of protecting doves.