Political Quotes

“I rise in support of Housing Concurrent Resolutions 275. For thousands of years before the first Europeans set foot on the continent of North America on the East Coast of Florida in 1513, Native Americans were already the great hunters and stewards of the New World that was to become America. They hunted, gathered and farmed as a way of life, which allowed them to live and prosper long before the great societies of Europe began to flourish. The native tribes of Florida fished in the great bays and estuaries, such as Tampa Bay, and hunted in the vast swamps and prairies up and down the Manatee River where Hernando De Soto landed to embark on the exploration of the new continent of America. The Native Floridian way of life depended on the game they hunted, the fish they caught and the crops they could grow. They only harvested what they needed and never took from the wild more than they could use. This was the birth of the American hunting tradition of being a steward of game and wildlife while engaging in the sport of hunting. When Florida was acquired by the United States in 1821, Florida pioneering families, affectionately called ``Crackers'' for the sound their whips made when driving cattle, came to settle on the vast Florida peninsula to stake out a claim for a new life. They depended on the abundance of wildlife to support themselves and their growing families.”