The first thing that came to mind when I read your post was, why not! The simple fact is that we humans have basicaly, over the years, killed off most of the large preditors(mountain lions,wolves,ect. By doing so it upset the real balance of nature as to preditor verses pray species. Prey species as a rule have much larger litters than the animals that feed upon them thus assuring that there is a viable population of each. By taking out the preditor factor we have created an imbalance in the natural scheme of nature. By doing so we have oblegated our selves to be the stewerds of the land. One of the ways we do this is through hunting and trapping. If we don't take on this responsibility and allow the the animals that would normally be kept in check(population wise) by predation, they will soon over populate their supporting habitat. When what happens mother nature will step in and she practices genocide. What I mean by that is that anytime a species is allowed to over populate not only will they start dieing off to starvation but the gene pool is weakened. The animals that normally would be eaten by a preditor(the weak and dumb) are allowed to pass on their genes to future offspring thus weaking the gene pool as a whole. Finally, these more disease prone animals will start to die off in numbers.When these are gone mother nature will slowly repopulate the area again. In a perfect balanced world these situations don't happen for the most part. It is our job,our responcibilty, to see that these situations don't happen. One of the most effective tools we have at our disposal is hunting and trapping. For a no dought better explation on why to allow trapping you should contact your local D.F.G. or D.N.R.biologist. I'am sure he can help you a lot more than I have. Good luck on your paper.