New-York tribune., 1877-03-12

THE LOTTERY 4ND POLICY BUSINESS.
The Temples of Fortune in this city are
swindlng shops kept by sharpcrs without a
morsel of mercy or q particle of honesty. Ihey
are usually maintained in obscure notes.-the
back rooms of pretended brokers' Offices III dis
reputable quarters-and whoever does business
with them might just as well throw his money
into the neighboring dock. This particular
kind of knavery has been exposed over and
over again those who practice 1t have been
many times arrested, and sometimes they have
been punishcd but in spite OF occasional
"raidsr upon it, like that Of last week, the
yillainous avOcatiOn is maintained, and poor
fools are continually bilked Of their
money without any mitigation of their pas
sion for childishly risking it. Sometimes the
policy shops have Respectable appearance,
are kept IN banking localities by those who
profess to be bankers, and are patrOnlZed, we
suppose, by people who wear good clothes.
But whether in Wal-st. or Greenwich-st., the
policy business is nothing but theft, and the
lottery business pure and simple is not much
better. This is perfectly well understood by
the courts, the police, the public generally,
and by everybody, in fact, except the dcludcd
creatures who are humbugged ont OF their
little cash again ard again without acquiring
an iota OF wisdom.
Most of the persons arrested have given
bail; some of them may he convicted ana
punished but others will escape and will go
on with their disrcputable calling i'll darker
corners and with greater precautions. The
good which comes of these so-called raids "
is not comprehensive nor by any means COM
plrte but at the same time it Is undenlaOle.
Ignorant people naturally suppose that call
ing which the law is lax i'll suppresslng Is not
so criminal as the statute would make 1t out
70 be. They do not believe in the cheatery OF
it, because they naturally argue if it were a
mere device for plundering them that the law
would intcrpose to protect them even against
the consequences Of their own folly. The
"rad," at least partially, opens their eyes, and
to some extent the evil is mitigated.
But spasmodc efforts of this kind accomplish
only limited amount OF good We all re-
member what tO-dO was made last Summer
about suppressng Sunday liquor selling. An
immense number OF complaints were entered;
for three or four Sundays show was kept up
of Rhadamanthine frmncsS and energy; and
vet Yesterday no doubt spirits and beer were
freely sold to all comers by all who pleased to
engage in the traffic. 1t ought to be distinctly
settled by this time that these little conStab-.
ulary spurts do good only for the time being;
that to be at all effectual they must be per-
sisted in; while the notifying conviction can
not be escaped that they never are per-
sisted in, and that the last state OF
a nuisance after the police has in
terfered with it is frequently worse than
the first What the policy dealers in this city
need is a constant succession of good hard hits,
until at last the life is knocked out of the busi
ness. If these gentry now held to bail have
gone back to their illicit dealings, arrest them
again, and then, if necessary, again; and then
let every indictment be followed by cOnvic-
ton and sentence. This will in time finish
policy playing, and nothing else will Make
it too expensive to those engaged in it, and
they will give it up. But so long as there is
money in it the game will be played cOvertly.
Ruin the dealers, and so ruin the business.