The Mt. Sterling advocate. (Mt. Sterling, Ky.) 1890-current, 1911-09-27
Driving Out Capital.

Americans justly entertain a
poor opinion of millionaire expat-
rates who live in England or
France because, in their opinion,
America is not suitable place of
residence for gentlemen of wealth
and l,isure. But the announce
ment of the withdrawal of wealthy
horsemen from America to make
their homes and race their
strings" on French and English
tracks can not be viewed with
complacency by lovers of good
sport or by liberal minded citizens
who protest against fanaticism be-
ing allowed to drive capital out of
the country.
Frank Gould is the latest horse
man to make known his intention
to settle in France because the
racing situation IN New York is so
discouraging. Many great breed
irg establishments are being dis
solved because New York passed
and may not repeal the utterly
unwarrantable law making direct
ors of tracks responsible for the
laying of wager between any
two persons within the Enclosure.
1t is admitted by advocates of the
law that it would be unreasonable
to try to enforce it to the letter,
but business men will not invest
money in racing plants, in horses,
in land for breeding farms when
such a law exists in the State that
contains tenth of the population
of the whole country. AS long as
the directors liability law" re-
mains on the statute books racing
will be dead in New York. And
its moribund condition will by no
means represent a triumph of the
anti-gambling element over gam
blers, but merely the victory of a
fanatical crusade over a sport and
a business. Gambling on races at
poolrooms does not end with the
death of racing locally and the
subdivision of paying tracks for
building lots. A meeting in Can
ada or Kentucky or Mexico is as
good as meeting at Saratoga in
solar as the never-lidded pool
rooms are concerned, And the
downtown" poolrooms are q
much more pernicious influence
than the betting sheds were at
their worst during race meetings.
Horsemen in Kentucky say that
whereas $500 weanlings and
yearlings were sold from Ken
lucky nurseries to New York in a
year before the suppression of
racing fewer than 300 will be sold
this year. This gives Kentucky a
peculiar interest in the outcome
of the fight for the renewal of
racing in New York, but it is not
because of that interest that the
Courier-Journal expresses the
opinion that the existing New
York law is at once an abridge-
ment of rights and an extremely
bad business policy. 1t has been
pretty thoroughly demonstrated
in Kentucky that the regulation of
racing is more advisable than its
suppression. The sport mas been
good at Churchill Downs and La
tonia since the association made a
clean sweep of the bookmakers.
Attendance has been good and the
outlook is good.
And if there is still more
or less handbook" gambling go
ing on, there is at least less off-of-
the-track bookmaking now than
there was when bookmaking was
permitted at the tracks and the
parimutual machines were I'M
known.
1t has not been the experience
of Kentucky that a moral uplift
resulted from the discouragement
of the eminently respectable bust
ness of breeding thoroughbreds,
which formerly engaged the at
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