Wilmont farmers Jim Joens and Richard Smith are seeing light at the end of the tunnel four years after they joined the fight to end mandatory participation in the national pork check-off program.

In response to a lawsuit filed by Joens, Smith and a handful of other plaintiffs, including the Minnesota-based Campaign for Family Farms, a U.S. District Court judge in Michigan ruled the national program unconstitutional.

As a result, the pork check-off program must cease by Nov. 24, pending any appeals.

Authorized by the National Pork Promotion, Research and Consumer Information Act of 1985, the pork check-off program requires all hog farmers to contribute a certain amount of their sales. The National Pork Board, charged with creating pork promotions, research and education with check-off dollars received roughly $57.4 million from the program in 2001.

The ruling means area farmers struggling to make ends meet in a poor hog economy will not have to pay the check-off's 40 cents per $100 of hogs sold. Until Sept. 30, the check-off was 45 cents per $100 sold.

But Joens said the ruling also has broader implications for independent family hog farmers.

"Yeah, it'll save me some money," Joens said, "but the bigger picture is we're trying to put the control of the market in the hands of the independent farmer and not the big farm corporations."

The lawsuit claimed advertising funded by the check-off, including the "Pork. The Other White Meat" campaign," failed to promote the unique qualities and attributes of hogs raised on family farms, the ruling reads.

Because check-off-funded advertising and research promotes larger, institutionalized farms more than independent farmers, judge Richard Alan Enslen ruled the program "unconstitutional and rotten."

"The government has been made tyrannical by forcing men and women to pay for messages they detest," Enslen's ruling reads, noting the mandatory program violates some hog farmer's First Amendment rights.

But not all pork producers are happy about the ruling. Larry Liepold, executive board member of the Minnesota Pork Producers Association and rural Okabena hog farmer, said the ruling would likely hurt independent farmers more than help them.

"The larger, more integrated producers have got the funds, in fact they have more funds, to run their own campaigns now," Liepold said, noting it will be difficult for independent farmers to pay for their own advertising and break into established markets.

"We're not evil people, we're not spending other producer's money unwisely," Liepold said of those who administer check-off monies. "I have always regarded the check-off as an investment in my own operation."

U.S. Agriculture Secretary Ann M. Veneman said in a press release that she was disappointed by the ruling, noting the check-off offers "effective tools for market enhancement when properly administered."

The USDA is working with the U.S. Department of Justice "to determine the next steps regarding this matter," Veneman said.

USDA National Communication Coordinator Jerry Redding said Tuesday that the USDA was not ready to say if it will ask the Department of Justice to appeal the ruling on their behalf.

In June, a federal judge in South Dakota declared the national beef check-off program unconstitutional because it violated the First Amendment rights of beef farmers. That decision was appealed in July and the beef check-off stands until the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 8th Circuit Court rules on the appeal.