M. Individual Gaming unconnected with Trade

(a) Illegal Games; (b) Card Playing.—The old-time absurdity of making certain games illegal, because they were the ones chiefly used as vehicles for gambling and left little room for skill, seems to have resulted in throwing upon the Courts the difficult task of deciding what other games come near enough to this class to share their disabilities, and to have culminated in shaping the law in a direction very unfortunate for public morality, so as to present a modicum of skill as a sufficient leaven to create immunity for a very large element of chance. The gambler avoids, as a rule, the named illegal games and turns to others. Blackstone remarks upon his infinite shifts and the varieties of his expedients, so that to pass laws especially applying to some games only merely drives him into other courses.

The true principle is that no game in itself is illegal, but that the gambling upon it may be. While the present laws make special regulations and enforce specific penalties upon certain games, others which may easily be as noxious cannot be dealt with. Consequently we have spasmodic and partial attempts to enforce the law, and a series of enigmatic and conflicting decisions in the Courts, resulting in a chaotic state of affairs in which little check is put upon gamblers.

(c) Playing with Gaming-Machines.—Notwithstanding that roulette is an illegal lottery, it is an unhappy fact that of late years it has been much more played than formerly. An inspection of tradesmen’s catalogues, and a glance round the departments at the stores, tends to confirm the impression that it and like games are becoming much more common. A member of the Bar who many years ago took the silk gown, and who was known to be averse to gambling, although going a good deal into society, has noticed how often the green cloth appears not long after dinner, sometimes after a postponement until he and those of like mind are about to leave. Its public use may have been put down, but in private houses and in clubs the roulette-table has multiplied its numbers. Here again, in connection with gaming-machines, corruption has spread and gone lower down. The automatic machines, at first used for the sale of sweetmeats, have been altered so as to be made the vehicles of gambling amongst the poorer classes, and especially children. They have already done irretrievable harm. Investigating the subject in the East End of London, the writer of these lines was told by a responsible person that they had taken such a hold upon the young that, while in classes of poor boys comparatively little difficulty was found in obtaining pledges not to drink and smoke, much reluctance has been evinced with regard to promises to give up petty gambling. Upon one occasion a bright boy flatly declined to add such a pledge to others, saying that he could not give up the excitement of using his coppers in this way. Most of the police prosecutions have been successful, and fines have been imposed under sec. 44 of the Police Act; while the machines were without hesitation pronounced to be illegal upon licensed premises. It may be hoped that the latest decision in Fielding v. Turner in the Divisional Court will go far towards stopping their use for gambling, now that they can be confiscated. So serious a matter had they become that the Home Secretary has promised to strengthen the law if need be. But the eagerness with which the temptation they offer has been responded to by the poorest of children should be a warning to the authorities against the old looseness of interpretation in the matter of laws against gambling. For children, at least, the old nonsense about skill and chance should be entirely swept away, and severe penalties enforced against all those who tempt the young in this manner. If not, the growing generation will be worse in gambling than the present one, and instead of a nation with a large minority devoted to the vice, it will develop into a general habit in which the majority are involved in one form or another.

(d) Lotteries and Sweepstakes.—Lotteries are matters of pure chance, which have been gradually restricted by a long series of statutory enactments; and in 1823 the last form, that of the public lottery, was abolished, the sole remaining exception being the ones connected with Art Unions, which have since been discontinued. Lotteries were found to be debauching the public and affording opportunities for fraud, but have not been wholly got rid of, as they are still carried on in connection with charity bazaars and in the form of sweepstakes, chiefly held upon horse-races. These latter, when subscribed privately and in clubs, are winked at by the authorities, but fitful prosecutions against publicans and others are heard of from time to time. Bazaar raffles, “fish-ponds,” etc., are no less illegal lotteries than sweepstakes under the Lottery Acts; they come within the provisions of 12 Geo. II. c. 28. It has, unfortunately, become customary for the authorities to take no action when raffles are held for charitable purposes, but all the churches of late years have been condemning the practice, and it is coming to be looked upon as a disreputable one, so that the law might now be enforced without any serious conflict with popular sentiment. It should be enough for clergy and ministers, however, to know that in the strict eye of the law those who have anything to do with bazaar raffles are rogues and vagabonds, if this is necessary to supplement the consideration that true religion must lose more than it gains by proceedings which have frequently involved the first step taken by the young in the paths of hazard, and led them into a career marred by misery if not crime. The existing statutes do not give the Post Office authorities sufficient powers for the detection and destruction of lottery matter; and the protection of newspapers advertising lotteries by 8 & 9 Vict. c. 74, making the fiat of the Attorney-General necessary for prosecutions, is considerably abused.

(e) Press Competitions and Coupon Gambling.—This is a most serious branch of the evil, for which the press is very largely responsible. Its grossest manifestation occurred some years ago in connection with horse-racing and football playing. Unfortunately, some years prior to this, in 1895, a judgment in Stoddart v. Sagar, the scope of which was mistaken by the public authorities, was held to rule the pernicious system outside of both the Lottery Acts and of the Betting House Act of 1853, and the question was neglected, with the consequence that the system grew to such an extent that in the year 1900 it was brought prominently before the council of the National Anti-Gambling League. Upon investigation they found, amongst other flagrant instances, the case of an obscure so-called sporting paper, the circulation of which had been raised by means of these coupons to 100,000 a week. At the trial of the proprietor, evidence was given on behalf of the General Post Office that the letters with remittances were so numerous as to necessitate a special delivery amounting to 20 sacks weekly. By evidence given by the London and Westminster Bank it was shown that £63,680 was paid in to the account of these valued customers in the first six months of 1900; and the prizes paid away to successful gambling competitors had risen from over £10,000 in 1897 to over £27,000 in 1898; over £47,000 in 1899; and to September only of 1900, to £46,000. It was not merely a penny or a shilling gamble, as any number of penny lines could be filled in in the coupon, and any number of coupons could be used by the same person, special directions being published in the paper to save those competitors trouble who were dealing in a large number, so that hundreds of pounds could be arranged for in a few minutes, and cheques remitted. The receipts of this one establishment in postal orders, etc., were shown to amount to £2000 to £3000 a week. The prize for the Lincoln Handicap of 1900 was £3000. The Courts unanimously decided that these coupon schemes came within the scope of the Betting House Act of 1853. This was confirmed in later cases in the King’s Bench Division and Appeal Court, and the judgments incidentally comprised the most valuable decision, that deposits to betting-houses were none the less such if received indirectly, and not at the premises. One loophole was left. The 1853 Act may not apply to betting-houses abroad. The proprietors moved their offices across the Channel, continuing their advertisements in the low sporting papers, and these were even admitted to otherwise respectable prints, tempted presumably by the higher rates shown in Court to be paid for this class of advertisement. An attempt was subsequently made in prosecuting The Sportsman to put a stop to this, but the King’s Bench Division held that section 7 of the 1853 Act relating to advertising could not be considered to cover these advertisements, although the judges expressed their regret, and the Lord Chief Justice laid stress in his judgment upon the necessity for legislation.

As matters stand there are two difficulties, viz. (1) betting-houses abroad (they are generally kept by British bookmakers who have moved across the Channel) are probably outside the scope of the 1853 Act, although their business is done by attracting the custom of the British public by advertisements in our newspapers and receiving bet deposits through our Post Office; and (2) the advertisements in question are so worded as to evade the precise terms of section 7 of the 1853 Act, so that the conniving newspapers cannot be punished. The consequence is that the nefarious business is carried on from offices abroad, and will be until stopped by a new Act. Cheating by the proprietors was common enough at the offices in the United Kingdom, but has greatly increased now that they are more out of the reach of their dupes, and some of them are being prosecuted by the police for fraud, for which extradition can be obtained, at the present time. This, however, will not stop the gullible public from sending their postal orders in myriads to other establishments; and its not being a criminal offence to publish in British newspapers, etc., advertisements of foreign betting-houses is one of the defects of existing legislation.

In addition to the above, however, organs of our low-class press, and other journals which might be expected to maintain some ethical standard, have been competing with each other in offering so-called prizes, frequently of high value, for all sorts of competitions, some depending much upon chance, and others cleverly disguised; the latter, unfortunately, penetrating to homes where the very thought of betting would be a scandal. Much demoralisation has been caused by the system, and the laws are inadequate to deal with many of its subterfuges.

The Government of France has set an example to ours of prompt action, although the evil there is an infant one as compared with ours, out of which indeed it has arisen, thus adding one more to the responsibilities of our nation for its gambling laxity. The occasion which aroused the ire of the authorities of our neighbours was the distribution by Le Petit Parisien of £24,000 in prizes for guessing the number of grains in a certain-sized bottle of wheat. The excitement was such that in ten days the circulation of the paper more than doubled, and special shops were opened in Paris and other large towns for the sale of bottles resembling the sealed one in question.