Josh First's Blog

PA gets full Sunday hunting!

Got a photo taken by someone standing front and center at the bill signing ceremony less than an hour ago, of Governor Josh Shapiro signing the Sunday Hunting legislation by PA Sen. Dan Laughlin and PA Rep. Mandy Steele into law. As of 45 minutes ago, Pennsylvania joins some forty-plus-other states with full Sunday hunting, which means full freedom and no artificial restrictions on Pennsylvania hunters.

For anyone and everyone who hunts, adding Sunday to the days available is an enormous opportunity. It is either 50% of the weekend, when most working people get to hunt, or it is 1/7th of the week, a substantial percentage of the total time allotted to us.

Yes, there were arguments against Sunday hunting, and none of them were persuasive. Most of them were flat out ridiculous, like suddenly the risk of “being shot” went through the roof, but only on Sundays. Even on posted private land! Many of the arguments were made in bad faith, by conservative religious people who nonetheless desired to aggressively control and deprive basic American freedom to law abiding hunters and families doing the most wholesome family stuff together. You know you can walk and chew gum simultaneously, and you can also pray on Sunday morning and then go hunt with a clear conscience… just like millions of American hunters do in almost all fifty states.

This was never a difficult policy question, it was a question of political power.

For the past 25 years that I have been involved in this, originally as the strongest plaintiff in a state lawsuit (which after argument was then kicked over to federal court like a political hot potato), the amount of political and social bullcrap we had to wade through was unbelievable.

Every nonsense complaint and argument was made against Sunday hunting, even though the states where it was already allowed had none of those problems as a result of it. No opponent ever conceded that private property should be unregulated in this regard. Heck, we could and often did target shoot all Sunday long on private property, and ride ATVs, which was perfectly fine, but one little .22 aimed at a squirrel was apparently Armageddon, the end of the world, oh, the humanity.

So here we are, with the PA Game Commission working right now to implement this freedom. I do not think it is likely that we will automatically see a bunch of Sundays open up in deer season this Fall, but I could be wrong. I hope I am wrong. More likely, we will see some small game and late deer season Sundays open up in January-February 2026, which will be most welcome. I imagine that by this time next year, we will get our printed hunting and trapping guide with probably close to every Sunday open to hunting from September dove and squirrel seasons through late flintlock and special regulations areas hunts into the end of January.

This means maybe an additional 16 days afield, total (four days each in October, November, December and January), but for those hunters who cannot hunt on Saturday, the weekend is finally theirs as much as it is anyone else’s to be free on. That is simple and long overdue justice.

Thank you to HUSH, to Senator Dan Laughlin, Rep. Mandy Steele, and to all of those who were in the trenches for these past twenty five years, namely Kathy Gehman (founder of HUSH along with Brad Gehman), Harold Daub, Kevin Askew, Robb Miller, and various Sportsman’s Alliance leaders.

FREEDOM!

PGC executive director Steve Smith on the Governor’s left

PA Governor Josh Shapiro signs Sunday hunting into law today, just an hour ago. Photo Credit goes to “mister anonymous” thank you very much