200 mile limit anniversary

[captnemo]

Can anyone remember back that far?
http://www.nj.com/shore/blogs/fishin...r_mobile_index

[buckethead]

"President Gerald Ford signed the Magnuson-Stevens Fisheries Conservation & Management Act on April 13, 1976, culminating a sad period in American history during which massive foreign fishing fleets destroyed our marine resources as close as 12 miles from shore.

Though this was during the Cold War period when many Americans were building bomb shelters in anticipation of an atomic attack by the Soviet Union, it was primarily Soviet fleets and those from the Iron Curtain countries they dominated that were wiping out one species after another with stern trawlers up to 423 feet with a crew of 232, plus much bigger mother ships – all bristling with antennas keeping track of U.S. shipping and defenses.
After the cod and haddock were wiped out in New England, the fleets virtually eliminated the mackerel and herring – and then cleaned out the red and silver hake (ling and whiting) in the Mud Hole as anglers found little left to catch and party boat skippers watched their livelihood disappearing while our leaders did nothing.
There was no Recreational Fishing Alliance to turn to in those days, so I called together those party boat captains plus sportsmen and conservationists aboard Capt. Les Baletti's Palace II at Hoboken on a February night in 1972 to form an organization to fight for a 200-mile limit just as Ecuador had done to protect their waters from American tuna seiners. Everyone said we didn't have a chance as both the State and Defense Departments were opposed to us – and the powerful California tuna industry didn't want to lose the protection of the Fisherman's Protective Act that paid their fines while violating Ecuador's 200-mile limit.
Yet, as chairman of the Emergency Committee to Save America's Marine Resources, I visited Rep. Norman Lent (R-NY) the next week – and he introduced a 200-mile limit bill. We held a rally in Sheepshead Bay the following week, and had congressmen coming to us seeking to become cosponsors. Another rally in Atlantic City (to which the Salt Water Anglers of Bergen County sent a bus) followed, and we started getting TV coverage of the devastation occurring just a few miles from the Metropolitan area. The stations supplied planes from which I could point out the huge fleets -- or we could make the short trips offshore aboard Capt. Howard Bogan's Jamaica fleet from Brielle.
My plan was to flood senators and representatives with letters calling for the 200-mile limit, and anglers did just that by utilizing the materials we developed which allowed them to identify their congressmen. Each of those letters had to be answered, and some congressmen told me they were getting more mail on the 200-mile limit than any of the hot issues of that period. Cosponsors built up rapidly, and before long some of the congressional leadership started getting involved with their own bills. Senators Magnuson (D-WA) and Stevens (R-AK) added the fishery management system (which we'd never had before) to the 200-mile limit. When President Ford signed that act, an Impossible Dream was achieved in just four years primarily because fishermen took the time to write so many letters that the problem couldn't be ignored any longer. I'll have more about the 200-mile limit fight and what it's led to in future columns."

How could I forget? I was a lot younger then and climbing all over the jetties. Those bunker boats would come right up to the surf line. Thanks to Al Ristori for keeping this in the limelight and his constant reminders to send letters. Without him we would have not been successful.

Thank you for posting as well, Capt.