A right to hunt and fish.

• Position: TRENDS AND TRANSITIONS

Sportsmen in many states increasingly feel as if they are the ones outside the duck blind, and they are turning to state constitutions to ensure their hallowed pastime will continue in perpetuity. Nine states ensure a constitutional right to hunt and fish, with Vermont's language dating to 1777.

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The rest of these constitutional provisions, however, have passed since 1996 in Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Minnesota, Montana, North Dakota, Virginia and Wisconsin. California and Rhode Island have language in their constitutions guaranteeing the right to fish, but not to hunt.

Increasing urbanization, decreased habitat, declining numbers of sportsmen, and more restrictions on hunting are common factors in the quest to assert the right to hunt and fish in a state's most basic and difficult-to-amend document.

Well-organized animal rights groups and restrictions on methods, seasons and bag limits for certain game species have provoked many hunter advocacy groups to lobby for hunting and fishing as a right.

Twenty-two states, including 12 in 2008 alone, have introduced legislation or ballot measures on this issue, with Oklahoma's and Tennessee's...