To hear participants tell it, the 5,000 or so commercial and recreational fishermen who descended on Washington, D.C., last week were united in their belief that federal fishery managers were regulating them out of business using bad science, or no science, to justify it.
The rally, held on the steps of the Capitol Building on Feb. 25, was organized by the Recreational Fishing Alliance and other organizations. It drew fishermen from up and down the East and West Coasts as well as from the Gulf of Mexico and Alaska. Starting from the Viking Fleet dock in Montauk, two Hampton Jitneys rolled the length of Long Island picking up fishermen as they went.
The rally also drew a number of sympathetic legislators from both parties. Among them were Representative Tim Bishop, Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, and Senator Charles Schumer, all Democrats from New York; Representative Frank Pallone Jr. of New Jersey, a Democrat, who spoke on behalf of the fishermen; Representative Barney Frank of Massachusetts, also a Democrat, and Senator Scott Brown, also of Massachusetts, a Republican.