The record-union. [volume] (Sacramento, Calif.) 1891-1903, 1892-01-18
THE LoTTERY's SIDE.

The New Orleans Times Democrat adj
voeates the cause of the lottery in the
present hot campaign in Louisiana. It's
reasons may be thus fairly summarized:
The voluntary tax is the lightest of all
taxation. The lottery unlicensed is an
unclaimed tiger; the lottery licensed is
means to voluntary tax under regula-
ton, and becomes, therefore, the purest
type Of voluntary taxation. when one
plays regulated lottery. The voluntary
tax is the most perfect tax, and is what
the world is striving after to-day. 1t
quotes Thomas Jefferson as saying ''the
tax is laid on the willing only; that is to
say, upon those who can risk the price of
lottery ticket without sensible injury
for the possibility of higher prize"
Money is wanted for a useful under
taking, as schools, for which direct tax
would be disapproved. tits raised, there
fore, by lottery" But, Mr.. Jefferson
holds, lotteries are useful on certain
occasions, and injurious only when car
ried beyond their useful bounds" For
this reason he thought lotteries should be
exercised only under the discretion of
the legislature; that is, they should be
licensed.
Now, asks this plausible journal, since
the lottery revenue is a voluntary tax, and
as no one need pay it who does not wish
to- why should others object? The peo-
pie who pay 1.-THE buyers of lottery
ickets-do not object. They give it
voluntarily, willingly. They know that
from twenty-five to thirty cents of every
dollar they give for lottery tickets goes
toward the support of the schools and
charitable institutions, the building of
levees, ETC., yet they ask for the privilege
of being allowed TO pay this tax, and
they doubtless feel all the better that the
money they give goes to such good pur-
poses. 1t is certainly better applied than
the money obtained from liquor licenses,
which barely suffices to pay the expenses
of the police, ETC., caused by the saloons.
Now, if the persons who buy lottery
tickets want to pay this tax, and can-or
think they can-pay it, without sensible
injury" as Mr.. Jefferson says, why
should the people of Louisiana, particu-
larly those who do not ''play lottery"
object to receiving the money?
This is the strongest argument that can
be made for the lottery. 1t is advanced
by its ablest and most dignifed cham
pion. But the answers to it are many,
ample and conclusive. Let us advance a
very few. The payment of the direct tax
does not debauch the morals, corrupt
youth nor lead the weak into extrava-
ganees they cannot afford. It does not
take from the person without giving
value received. It does not squander 20
per cent. of the peoples money and con-
vert it to private purses solely to secure
30 per cent. to the State. The lottery by
all men is recognized as gambling, and
the history Of the world gives not one in
stance of legalized gambling that did not
degrade and pauperize the people, dull
the moral sense and result in hopeless
ruin to the hosts of unfortunate beings.
But the proposition in Louisiana is not
one such as Jefferson treated, though we
are not content to accept even that great
statesman's conclusions as impregnable;
his is not the only fine mind that has
erred. In Louisiana it is not proposed to
regulate the lottery. On the contrary
it is simply to give it absolute and uncon-
trollable freedom from legislative inter
ference for twenty-five years, if it will
pay the price the State will thus set upon
its birthright. 1t is proposition to lit
orally tie the legislative hands, and to
''hold-up" all municipal authorities. 1t
is proposed, in short, to say to the lottery
concern ''you may prey upon the people
without limit, and make 53 per cent.
profit or 90 per cent, if you will give
from 20 to 80 per cent. of your gross in
come to the State" 1t makes indeed the
State partner in the lottery. 1t is a
proposition to legalize a species of rob-
berry, and while no one need play at the
game who does not wish to, the whole
scheme rests upon traffic in the weakness
of human nature. 1t is, as proposed
in Louisiana, monopolistic gambling.
without the semblance of honesty. It
leaves all matter of so-called regulation
to individuals and their discretion as to
the drawings and the mode of conduct
ing the business.
These are but a few of the answers that
can be given; but we need not add to
them. We have published so much of the
anti-lottery view that we have thought it
well TO give the best argument of the pro-
lottery people, as advanced by this most