St. Landry clarion. (Opelousas, La.) 1890-1921, 1892-01-16
BUSINESS REASONS.
How Tt Affects the Retail Dealers
why All Business Men Should
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Vote Againt the Lottery.
The following from the New Delta, ad-
dressed to the business men of New Or
leans, will apply to that class throughout
the State; for if the Lottery should suc-
ceed it will probably establish lottery
shops in all the larger country towns.
l. The lottery has made a combination
with the hoodlums and ward bosses which
means the triumph of nlisrule and bad
government in the city, and the conse-
auent injury of all interests, public and
private, and all trade, wholesale and retail.
3. No business man sells anything until
he knows what is the value of the thing
sold No inquiry was made by the Legis-
lature into the value of the grant made to
Morris. None of the lottery papers or ora
tors dare tell you how much the lottery
will make out of the Morris grant. 1t
means 81 for the State and ten ($i0) dollars
for the lottery If the people want a lot
terry, let them have one which will give the
State $40 and keep 81 for themselves.
3. The Morris lottery is a dishonest and
unfair lottery Its schemes are rascally
and dishonest. In the monthly drawing
it proposes every month to sell the public
$2O0o00o worth of tickets and to give back
in prizes.oniy $105440o thus making the
public lose 945 400 8 month
In the daily drawing the percentage
against the players is so enormous as to
amount almost to highway robbery.
A. Every dollar that goes to the lottery
from the people of New Orleans is lost to
the retail tradesmen and people of this
city If there was no lottery TO play every
day and every month, the people would
buy more bread and meat, more groceries,
more clothes, more shoes and better furni-
ture and household effects. How much
they get from the people of New Orleans is
oo.,, t, LOTT offer Ifl1 0GN
worth of tickets every year in the monthly
drawings, of which they actually sell about
20 per cent or about $19,600,000. Seven per
cent of these tickets are sold in Louisiana
and out of this per cent IN New orleans,
making the sales of tickets in the monthly
drawing in New Orleans amount TO $l, l76-
600 per annum. Supposing the tickets sold
in New Orleans draw their share OF the
prizes, the ticket buyers would be bound to
lose $56I,43 every year.
By actual count of the police authorities
there are 103 policy shops in New Orleans
were tickets in the daily drawings are sold.
The receipts of these shops average $50 each
every day. or $6IS0 for the whole per day.
The wheel turns 313 times every year
which makes the receipts from these policy
shops amount to the enormous sum Of W
2S2,400 year. OF this sum about 40 per
cent goes back in prizes, SO that the lottery
keeps 81 PIG 844 which the people lose.
Add to this the $564,4S0 lost on the
monthly drawing and it clearly appears
that the lottery takes from the people of
New Orleans every year the enormous sum
Of about Si,7Sl zoo, or more than $500,00o
more than they propose to give the State
for their franchise
According TO the directory there are
about 5000 retail business houses in New
Orleans where bread, meat, shoes, hats,
clothes, groceries, household goods, articles
of adornment and pleasure are sold TO
mainly the wage-earning people. This
enormous sum stolen bv the lottery. prin-
cipally from this class of people, represents
an average trade of nearly 5000 per annum
to each one of these traders-or $50 per
month from each of them
What do you get in return for this enor-
nous loss in trade? You get bad paying
customers, embezzling clerks, thieving ser
wants, dissatisfied patrons, a generally de-
moralized community and diminishing