The San Francisco call., 1896-03-28
LOTTERY NOTICES.

President Andrews of the Brown Uni
versity gives, in the current number OF
Scripner's Magazine, deserved credit to
the members of the Fifty third Congress
who were instrumental in bringing about
the passage of the anti-lottery bill, which,
as he says, ''was carried through Congress
in spite of perhaps the most powerful and
enterprising lobby influence ever organ
ized.'
The credit given to the advocates of the
bill is we'll deserved, and yet it is apparent
to every observant person that the battle
against the evil has been but half won and
the lotteries are not vet suppressed. Evil
dence of their existence is to be found con-
spieuously displayed IN the advertising or
the news columns of every newspaper ex-
cept the few which, like THE CALL, honor
law more than money and refuse to pro-
mote an illicit traffic, by advertising it for
the sake of gain. If, therefore, credit is
due to those who struck the first blow at
the evil, still more credit will be due to
those who devise measure that will crush
it altogether.
1t is not creditable to American journal
ism that newspapers aspiring to have good
repute and influence in the community
should consider themselves justified in
taking advantage of defect in the law TO
advertise trade which it is criminal of
Tense to carry on. To do this is to make
journalism the resort of professional
swindlers and the deceiver of the public.
1t is to violate the spirit of law while pro-
Tossing to keep the letter and to afford a
means by which traffic that otherwise
could be confined to the slums and hidden
places of the City can find an entrance
into every household and be temptation
to the inmates of every home.
OF course, our lottery advertising con-
temporaries do not sin for nothing. The
men who were able to concentrate at
Washington perhaps the most powerful
| and enierprislng lobby influence ever or
ganized" are equally able to diffuse
| throughout the country a corrupting in
t1uence hardly less powerful. Lottery no.
tices command the highest prices for ad-
vertising that are paid. There is big money
in them for those who publish them. THE
CALL knows very well the pecuniary sacri-
flee it makes in refusing them. The very
greatness OF this power, however, is all the
more reason why it should be opposed at
every opportunity. by every means and by
every citizen, for the fact that it can af-
| ford to pay so high for notices is proof
that the trade continues to flourish and
make enormous profits, despite the law
that condemns it as crime.
In the absence of law making the pub
| lication of lottery notices an offense sub.
iecting the publisher to a heavy penalty
the only recourse the law-abiding people
of a community have against the intro
duction OF the corrupting evil into their
homes is to refuse to receive there any
paper that publishes such notices. Police
officials have repeatedly stated that if
they could stop the advertising 1t would
not be long before they would be able to
rid the community of the evil altogether.
1t remains, then, to be seen whether such
publications cannot be checked by the
exercise of the moral force of the COM
munirv. If the decent homes of the City
will reject the lottery papers THE CALL
will not long stand alone in its fight for
the law. That rejection should be made
without hesitation. The homes, the
churches and the press should unite with
the police and the courts to uphold the
law of the land and suppress the swindlers.