I explained to someone in another post: law is written by politicians. And, getting changes to a law is sometimes a tightrope act.
I haven't tried to reconstruct the history of this particular law, but I suspect that exception clause was added later, to address an oversight: teenage hunters. But unless you read it carefully, you don't realize that it effectively excepts 17-yr-olds, while still imposing some prerequisites for younger.
I saw something similar in my state: a bad law was modified in a way that wasn't immediately obvious to people that might oppose the change.
Yes. Sometimes politicians pass laws with the intent to do a thing, only to find out that they unintentionally make it worse for an edge case for the very rights that they actually support, and have to go back later and clarify. It's often not something that comes up until it gets tested in court in a high profile case, or with a special interest group with some political clout pushing it.
The law is worded very poorly, and should be cleaned up...
I explained to someone in another post: law is written by politicians. And, getting changes to a law is sometimes a tightrope act.
I haven't tried to reconstruct the history of this particular law, but I suspect that exception clause was added later, to address an oversight: teenage hunters. But unless you read it carefully, you don't realize that it effectively excepts 17-yr-olds, while still imposing some prerequisites for younger.
I saw something similar in my state: a bad law was modified in a way that wasn't immediately obvious to people that might oppose the change.
Yes. Sometimes politicians pass laws with the intent to do a thing, only to find out that they unintentionally make it worse for an edge case for the very rights that they actually support, and have to go back later and clarify. It's often not something that comes up until it gets tested in court in a high profile case, or with a special interest group with some political clout pushing it.