Until 1999, Hegins, Schuylkill County, played host every Labor Day to a barbarous event posing as a sport. It involved using live pigeons, trapped or captive-bred, as target practice.

The birds were released from tiny cages one at a time and then blasted by shooters. Those not killed outright, which was common, were then picked up by young boys who terminated the wounded fowl by wringing their necks or ripping their heads off.

This ended because Hegins became a notorious symbol for animal cruelty and because the state Supreme Court ruled in 1999 that humane officers had jurisdiction to take legal steps against the organizers, even if they were not from the same county.

While Hegins is no longer hosting pigeon slaughter, other gun clubs are. Humane officers can take steps to stop pigeon shoots, but because the court ruled on a narrow point of law, they are not actually illegal in this state as they are in most others.

Pennsylvania needs a law to stop this travesty that serves only to encourage blood lust and give legitimate hunters a bad name. The Humane Society of the United States says five gun clubs in three counties in the east are still organizing shoots. Lawsuits have been filed to stop the practice, but they remain tied up in the courts.

Shooting dozens of birds that barely have a chance of escape endures because of a culture that sees any limit on guns or hunting as a threat by outsiders on a way of life. Some officials in the courts and the Legislature buy into this resentment and are happy to let Pennsylvania go on being primitive. The Legislature has had previous chances to pass a law but has not.

Now it has another chance with House Bill 73, which would prohibit pigeon shoots at long last. It would do so in the knowledge that these events are not a sport and this is not about hunting or limiting gun use -- in fact, decent hunters ought to be appalled that this goes on, so contrary is it to the sporting instinct.

No, this is about animal cruelty, the mass extermination of birds, and as such Pennsylvania should no longer tolerate it. HB 73, now in a House subcommittee, should receive support from members of both parties. The embarrassment of Hegins lives on in other areas and nothing justifies that.