The following table may prove of interest to the reader, as showing the amount and character of the gambling practiced in New Orleans during the past ten years. It has been carefully prepared from the most authentic sources available and it is believed to be a very close approximation to the exact facts:
| PROFITS OF BROKERS, | ||
| DESCRIPTION OF GAMBLING. | AMOUNTS CHANGING | GAMBLERS, |
| HANDS. | LOTTERY CO. AND | |
| DEALERS IN T’KS. | ||
| Speculation in Stocks, Futures, etc. | $82,000,000 | $10,145,945 |
| Lottery Tickets, | 18,600,000 | 8,370,000 |
| Policy Playing, | 8,000,000 | 3,200,000 |
| Regular Gambling, | 30,000,000 | 3,400,000 |
| Total, | $138,000,000 | $25,115,945 |
| Note.—The figures given include only the local business. The total amount received from sales is vastly greater. | ||
From the foregoing sketch of gambling in New Orleans, it will be apparent to the reader that there has never been any determined effort put forth for its suppression. This fact may be ascribed to two operative causes. First, the absence of any pronounced public sentiment against gaming; secondly, the powerful political influence wielded by the gamblers. The latter have always been active ward politicians, and have exercised great influence upon local elections, in fact, they have usually had one or more of their representatives; indeed, at one time, the Chief of Police, the officer on whom devolved the duty of enforcing the law against gambling, was himself an ex-professional. At other times, gamblers who were actively engaged in the business have been members of the city council, tax collectors or supervisors of registration, besides filling numerous other State and City offices. Of the four men who, as ward “bosses,” virtually controlled the politics of the city from 1876 to 1888, one was an active gambler.
The “sports” had become politicians[politicians], and ten or a dozen of them were recognized as active “workers,” whose support was valuable to the “bosses.” In consequence legislation adverse to gambling was well nigh impossible, and the enforcement of the laws already on the statute book had become dilatory and half-hearted. So weak was the sentiment in the legislature against[against] gaming that that body, at its last session, had refused to pass a law requiring saloons where private gambling was conducted, to place a screen behind their front doors.
At the present time, gambling in the city is comparatively at a standstill. Many of those who have been prominently identified with the business in the past have sought other pursuits, which, although of a kindred character, have proved more profitable, such as the keeping of “turf exchanges,” “book making,” etc.
The city council having refused to indorse the suggestion of Mayor Shakspeare, that the indirect system of licensing be revived, finally mustered up courage to instruct the executive to close all houses. While the order cannot be said to have been literally and fully obeyed, its passage and the official action following the same have proved a deadly blow to public gambling.
Two striking instances may be mentioned, which serve to show not only the immediate effect of a sudden reversal of public policy in this regard, but also to illustrate the deep hold which this pernicious vice obtains upon its victims.
On October 3, 1889, Joseph M. Marcus, a young merchant and a partner in a large tobacco concern, lodged a bullet in his brain while standing near the main entrance of one of the parish prisons. Temporary abberation[abberation] of mind, resulting from insomnia and apprehension of financial loss was supposed to have been the cause of his rash act. Later in the day, Napoleon Bonaparte White, one of the best known of the local gambling fraternity, was found dead in his bed, in a lodging house. A vial, in which remained a few drops of a decoction of morphine was found near him, and its presence was supposed to be a sufficient explanation of the manner of his death. About the time that the executive order was being prepared—the day before his decease—while the Mayor and Chief of Police were conferring upon the subject, White appeared to be much depressed and said that he had provided a method of evading the enforcement of the law; that he had purchased a pistol which he proposed to use in case the order was enforced. White’s career had been an eventful one. An engineer by profession, he had started in life on the Mississippi steamboats. His ambition and temperament soon drew him from the engine room to the saloon of the steamboat, where he blossomed forth as a professional gambler. When Walker planned his famous expedition to Nicaragua in 1856, White was one of the first to enroll himself in the band of volunteers. After the final collapse of the expedition, he drifted back to his old haunts in New Orleans, where for many years he was one of the most familiar figures upon the streets.
Instances are numerous where men have won or lost their daily bread upon the turn of a card. There have been not a few who, having staked their all upon the same contingency and lost, have blown out their brains with the weapon of despair. The sun-kissed hill-tops and low-lying valleys that surround Monte Carlo, contain the graves of not a few devotees of gaming, who in despair have ended their wretched lives. There is no sort of emotion which the fascination of this vice has not awakened in the human breast. There are a few rare instances relative to gamblers who have fallen dead in a superabundance of sudden joy. But never before, so far as is known, have two gamblers killed themselves because they believed that they were about to be deprived of the opportunity of indulging in their favorite pastimes. These instances stand unprecedented and unparalleled[unparalleled] in history.
MILWAUKEE.