By John Hawke

When the intelligent public has become convinced of the existence of a great social evil, it wants to know, in the first place, what laws are in existence which can be applied in remedy of it, and what amendments of the law are needed.

The text-books upon the present laws, through no fault of their authors, are somewhat obsolete, owing to recent not altogether consistent decisions of the Courts, although Law Relating to Betting, by G. H. Stutfield, and Law of Gambling (Coldridge and Hawksford), contain much valuable information. The following summary is intended to present a skeleton view of the legal position at this date, and for sake of convenience the subject is divided under the two heads of Miscellaneous Gambling and Betting. Whichever portion of the subject is treated, it will be observed that the laws are both inadequate and not fully applied.

Miscellaneous gambling must be subdivided into (M) all kinds of individual gaming unconnected with trade; (N) gambling in the stock, produce, and other markets.

Miscellaneous Gambling

M. Individual Gaming unconnected with Trade

• (a) Illegal Games.
• (b) Card Playing.
• (c) Playing with Gaming-Machines.
• (d) Lotteries and Sweepstakes.
• (e) Press Competitions and Coupon Gambling.
• (f) Gambling Clubs.
• (g) Petty Gambling.

(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.

(f) Gambling Clubs.—Habitual gambling in the social clubs of wealthy Englishmen has led to a very anomalous state of the law and of its application. It is not worth while to go further back than the case of Downes v. Johnson (Albert Club) to illustrate this. There was no serious dispute as to this not being a betting club, or that the purpose of its existence was not betting. No reasonable person could for a moment doubt that if betting were stopped the club would collapse, and the police authorities in 1895 made an attempt to bring about this result. They had good reason for knowing the evil arising from it. That provisions could be obtained, and were consumed in considerable quantities, was shown; but any serious contention that such a club was a social club would be dispelled by a visit to the premises, in an obscure court turning out of Fleet Street. The judges, however, appeared to be hampered by a desire to shield private betting, and the judgment remains the charter for organised house betting under the protection of the name of club. There are several other such large institutions in London and elsewhere (besides innumerable smaller ones), the chief of those in the metropolis being notorious gambling centres, where settling day is carried on in the same business-like way as on the Stock Exchange. They all owe their continued existence to the reluctance of the Courts and Parliament to deal with the card and Turf gambling which goes on at the well-to-do clubs, and thousands of gambling centres all over the country are shielded by this unhappy partiality.

The above decision may be said to have broken up any efficiency of existing legislation, and so pernicious has its effect been that a very modest attempt to reduce the number of the poorer class institutions was at last introduced as a makeshift in the Licensing Act for the registration of clubs, which came into force on January 1, 1903. It is true that it only applies to clubs selling liquor, but as betting men are almost invariably drinkers it is probably comprehensive in this sense. Its inefficiency was illustrated last May by a decision of Mr. Justice Bucknill, by no means a lover of betting men, who presumably considers himself bound by former decisions. The judge must have known the extreme difficulty of the police getting evidence at all, and that it probably could not be got except by the raid, which he approved, and that a second raid after such a warning would almost inevitably be abortive. Yet, although systematic betting was proved, he ruled that it was not illegal, although it might have been so if it had been shown to go on day after day. The false protection extended to the race-course rings by the Powell-Kempton Park case would be incomplete if it were not to cover the betting clubs, and no branch of the gaming laws is more defective than with regard to these latter.

Last year the Grand Jury at Liverpool made a presentment in which they called attention “to the large sums of money extracted from the public by the so-called social clubs, which have formed the subject of several of the prosecutions which have come before us, and we feel that much harm must be done to working men and clerks belonging to the city by the assistance of these clubs.” Unfortunately, while the Act in question gives facilities for proceedings against such institutions, the police are often bribed. The writer knows of more than one instance of notice of a coming raid having been secretly given by police officers. In one case in London the proprietor openly boasts his defiance of any attempt to set the law in motion against him. Matters are no better in the provinces, and are not likely to be anywhere until the police have been thoroughly overhauled.

(g) Petty Gambling.—A few only of the multifarious forms of petty gambling can be mentioned here, principally with reference to the temptations spread before the rising generation. Amongst them are the automatic machines referred to above, which an ever-vigilant and not too scrupulous commercial instinct has been busy in turning to account for the purpose. Playing-cards figure also under this heading as a very widespread source of demoralisation among the young, especially in poor districts. Enormous quantities are sold in this country, as statistics show, and now that they are made small and cheap they are to be found everywhere. Amongst the young—where there is no bribery or but little—the police are more active and unrestrained. Gaming with cards and in other forms in a public place is prohibited, and prosecutions in connection with them are frequently reported in the newspapers. It is consequently often followed by juveniles in the poorer class refreshment-houses, and the proprietors are liable if in any way conniving at it, as in the case of a man at Hammersmith, where fifteen boys were found playing nap, and it was shown that he charged each boy a penny by the half-hour for the table. This sort of thing is going on all over the kingdom, and between the example set by their elders and the difficulty of passing more drastic laws while leaving gambling almost unfettered for rich people, the coming race in Great Britain promises to be worse rather than better, notwithstanding all the efforts of reformers. Sir W. H. Stephenson said at Newcastle some time ago, in sentencing a group of lads for gambling, that he did not know what would become of the rising generation. Very numerous instances could be quoted of remarks showing the astonishment and despondency felt by magistrates generally. At many of the Courts hardly a week passes but what a batch of these young offenders has to be dealt with. Organised Sunday gambling is very common in numbers of districts, regular scouts and a system of signalling being maintained to outwit the police.

N. Gambling in the Stock, Produce, and other Markets

It may be said that there is positively no effective legislation in existence, if an exception be made of the Bank Act 1867, 30 Vict. c. 29, which provides for contracts identifying the shares of banks bought and sold. However thoroughly we may be convinced that much of the business in the above marts is to a great extent a matter of gaming, it is impossible to ignore the fact that there is a large amount of legitimate business transacted in them, and that the commercial world could hardly exist without them. There is, moreover, the great difficulty of drawing a line between the commerce and the gambling. Of course the havoc and ruin arising are known to all. The Stock Exchange is probably responsible for as much loss and misery as even the Turf, and the suffering caused in Lancashire by the recent cotton gambling is but one instance, and that as it were a by-product, of the extravagant transactions of the produce exchanges. Pages might be filled with instances, such as the sale on a single occasion of two millions of a well-known railway’s stock, only £500 of it being a genuine investment. Where a commercial element is inherent, and of shifting and unascertainable proportions, difficulty has hitherto been found in framing laws against gambling which would not hamper legitimate enterprise; and consequently, in our country, by leaving things alone, the gambler has been actually encouraged by allowing him to go scot free of the moderate pro rata dues exacted from the investor. In this particular the present laws are most unhappily defective, and when we come to deal with remedies on a later page suggestions will be made upon the subject.

In the forefront of existing legislation with regard to betting is the great statute known as the Betting Act 1853, 16 & 17 Vict. c. 119. “This most salutary Act,” as Lord Chief Justice Russell called it, was passed when betting by the deposit of ready money was carried on to an enormous extent in houses and offices in towns, and only to a very limited extent in race-course enclosures; and the Attorney-General of the day, in telling the House of Commons that the Bill was not intended to interfere with Tattersall’s, was either unaware how rapidly the ready-money system at the races was growing, or designedly suppressed allusion to it, as an awkward question not absolutely necessary to be faced at the time. The Act crushed the town houses, and the business was transferred to the rings, and the question of the application of the Act to these open-air betting-shops was not decided by the (Criminal) High Court until 1897, in Hawke v. Dunn (1897, 1 Q.B.), when Mr. Justice Hawkins, whose knowledge of the Turf was well known, delivered an unanimous judgment on behalf of the five judges of the Queen’s Bench Division who heard the case, holding the rings to be nothing but betting-houses or places. This meant police raids upon the rings, and the writer was assured at Scotland Yard that the police force would do its duty. But the stoppage of half the race meetings in the country was involved, and the Jockey Club and the bookmakers immediately trumped up a collusive civil case—Powell v. Kempton Park Co., Ltd. (1897, 2 Q.B.)—which could be carried above the (Criminal) High Court. The supposed plaintiff was a clerk in the office of the business men of the Jockey Club. It could not be found that he was either a householder or a ratepayer at the suburban address endorsed on the writ. His only status was obtained by getting a single share in the Kempton Park Co. from one of its directors, a bookmaker, and within a month of the above decision a writ was issued by him under the pretext that he wished to prevent the company permitting the illegalities condemned in Hawke v. Dunn, but for the real purpose of re-trying the question in a form which might give a chance of overthrowing that decision in the Court of Appeal and the House of Lords. In each case the Courts were divided, but the majority of both went against the unanimous judgment of the Criminal Judges, although the collusion and misstatements were of so scandalous a nature that they were denounced by more than one member of the latter tribunal. These cases were long, but for the general public the question of whether the existing legislation of the Act of 1853 ought or ought not to have been held to apply to the rings can be put in a nutshell. All the Courts agreed that the rings must be treated as if they were capable of being “places.” How then could they be ruled out of the Act? Everything turned upon the construction of the language of sections 1 and 3; here it is, abbreviated but not altered: “Any person who, being the owner or occupier of any place, or a person using the same, shall open, keep, or use the same for the purpose of any money being received, etc.; and any person who, being the owner or occupier, shall knowingly and wilfully permit the same to be opened, kept, or used by any other person for the purpose of any money being received, etc.” Everything turns upon the italicised words. Lord Chancellor Halsbury and the majority of the judges took the only view under which it was possible to protect the rings, by holding those italicised words to mean a person having authority over the whole ring, a person analogous to and of the same genus as the owner or occupier, and therefore as not applying to any one of the various bookmakers carrying on business on his own account within it. Three questions which were not asked should have disposed of this view entirely:—

(1) If the any other person is a person analogous to and of the same genus as the owner or occupier, why is he in this second part of section 3 clearly considered to be in the subordinate position of a user by permission? And if this second part of the section does not hit such a person as the bookmaker, what possible person can it be aimed at, not already struck by the first part of the section (other than those having the care or management separately named later on)?

(2) Why did the Act immediately stop the business of the town houses? For, under the construction now given to it, the proprietor had merely to alter his arrangements, announcing that he himself would take no part in the betting, but would get his profit by an entrance fee charged to all comers alike, as the proprietors of the rings do.

(3) Under this construction, what is to prevent houses or rooms being opened in towns by hairdressers, tobacconists, or others, charging an entrance fee to all comers, but the proprietor taking no part in the betting?

Briefly summed up, the House of Lords’ judgment comes to this. The Kempton Park ring owners or occupiers are not responsible, because they do not themselves carry on the business of betting in the ring; and the bookmakers are not responsible, because, although they do this, they are not owners or occupiers, or persons using the same in control of, or authority in the place.

We have pointed out that the Act could have been shown to apply to the bookmakers but for the disgraceful collusion of this case, in which plaintiff and defendants desired the same result; but it is proper to qualify this by saying that the professional men, upon one side at all events, should be looked on as dupes rather than accomplices. Unhappily, it must be added that such a black page of disgrace would not have defaced our Law Reports but for private and influential pressure brought to bear upon certain members of the Courts of such a nature as to have outweighed with them the fearful responsibility of throwing open every public-house in the kingdom—indeed, potentially, every private house—as an authorised betting establishment; for the decisions finding public-houses to be “places” because bookmakers carry on business in them is absolutely contrary to the Powell-Kempton Park judgment, although this is done occasionally by the Courts, most anxious as all of them are to prevent the evils arising from public-house betting; but the shifts to which they are driven to reconcile their decisions with the Kempton judgment are almost as amusing as they are humiliating. Thus the strong arm of the Act of 1853 has been temporarily paralysed, and these peripatetic Monte Carlos all over the kingdom, the rings, have had their lives prolonged for the present.

There are, however, two subordinate sections, 5 and 7, which are of great importance, or rather have become so through the exertions of the National Anti-Gambling League. By judgments obtained in the King’s Bench Division, and confirmed by the Court of Appeal (Lennox v. Stoddart and Davis v. Stoddart, C.A. 1902—2 K.B.), under sections 1 and 3 of the 1853 Act, the deposit of money for betting is illegal, even though not made direct to the house or place of business of the bookmaker. By these judgments it will be seen that all bookmakers advertising from offices in the United Kingdom and receiving deposits (before the issue of the events betted upon) there or elsewhere, directly or indirectly, are keepers of betting-houses, and their advertisements illegal under section 7; and that the newspaper proprietors admitting these advertisements are also offenders under the same section. This has only recently become clear in law, and still awaits application on a large scale. The same remark applies to the operation of section 5, under which, by the Court of Appeal decisions referred to, all such deposits can be reclaimed for the senders by the special statutory right of the Act; in the words of Lord Justice Matthew, as “a penalty, or mulct in the nature of a penalty, for a violation of the terms of the Act of Parliament.” In many cases considerable sums have already been refunded by the bookmakers, but, while any loophole is left open by doubts as to the application of the Act of 1853 to bookmakers ostensibly giving no address in the United Kingdom, but carrying on business across the Channel, there is something to be said for the policy of not pressing the application of sections 5 and 7 before other lines of the campaign against the professional betting system.

Although the destructive judgment in Powell v. Kempton Park reduces the public fear of betting in houses or places other than race-course rings to little more than a popular superstition, provided such places are arranged as indicated above, that fear still prevails, and has consequently brought about a regular system of betting almost anywhere and everywhere out of doors, commonly known as street betting. For many years the association formed to combat the general evil has busied itself, inter alia, in getting County and Municipal authorities to pass bye-laws against this street system of betting, and these are now in force in about 150 areas, including many of the principal cities and counties, but the Acts sanctioning these bye-laws (Counties, sec. 16 Local Government Act 1888; Cities, Towns, etc., sec. 23 Municipal Corporations Act 1882) only permitting a maximum fine of £5, without powers of arrest and search, have been found unequal to the evil, so that the fines are merely looked upon by the bookmakers as a tax on profits; and to the despair of the authorities the effect is merely to enhance the police fines by a small share of the profits of the trade. Wealthy bookmakers employ several underlings, and drive round in a trap at stated intervals to receive their takings, never appearing themselves before the magistrates, but merely supplying the fines to their servants. Others surround the exits of places of business of all kinds at the dinner hour, or even collect deposits at the small houses of the workers, during their absence, from their wives; and numbers of them adopt the subtle plan of bribing foremen and forewomen on the business premises to act as their agents by giving them a commission on the profits. Circulars have been published in the Times, received from bookmakers by foremen in the employ of mercantile firms of first class standing, offering 10 per cent commission to influential employees. Convincing evidence was given before the Select Committee of the House of Lords as to the deteriorating effects of the professional betting system upon the character and work of British artisans, and the information subsequently published by the Moseley Commission strongly confirms this in making comparisons with foreign workmen.

SUGGESTED ALTERATIONS IN THE LAW

Betting

Having laid before the reader an account of existing legislation at the commencement of the twentieth century with regard, firstly, to Miscellaneous Gambling, and, secondly, Betting, suggestions shall now be made as to how the law can be amended and made more operative; but as the last of the two items, Betting, is freshest in the mind, the order shall be reversed, and it shall first occupy our consideration.

It would be useless to confuse the reader’s mind by going through the statutes relating to betting, other than the Act of 1853, which is the reformer’s armoury; but it requires to be refurbished and enlarged, and will then be capable, supplemented by the proposed Street Betting Bill, of bringing about a great and beneficial change.

What is desirable must be subdivided into what may be considered now practicable, in accordance with the position approached by public opinion; and further reforms, to prepare the way for which social reformers have still much to do.

It may be wise, and save time in the end, to confine attempts at legislation to three short and simple improvements, viz.: (1) passing the Street Betting Bill for largely increasing the fines and inflicting imprisonment for that offence, as unanimously recommended by the Select Committee of the House of Lords; (2) an amendment of section 7 of the Betting Act of 1853, subjecting advertisements of foreign betting-houses to the same penalties as those in the United Kingdom; and altering the wording of the same, which now only condemns advertisements “whereby it shall be made to appear,” which words were regretfully held by the King’s Bench Division in Ashley and Smith, Ltd., v. Hawke, K.B.D. 1903 (Sportsman), not to cover the advertisements of notorious betting-houses, as the advertisements on their face merely referred to races, etc., and gave the necessary address for communications and remittances. Such advertisements have always been considered as dubiously lawful, and double charges are paid for their insertion. More than one of the sporting, or rather betting, papers make profits of £5000 to £7000 a year out of them; and the Lord Chief Justice, in his judgment, spoke of the necessity of legislation, as has been already stated; (3) making payments of bets in public-houses illegal. A Bill of twenty lines might cover the whole of the above.

With these three amendments of the law, and Scotland Yard enforcing the present laws as expounded in the Court of Appeal cases above against the betting-houses, great progress will be made. The bankruptcy authorities should take advantage of these decisions to insist upon the return of all monies sent to bookmakers by debtors within the statute of limitations, under section 5 of the 1853 Act.

But these improvements, so long as the Powell v. Kempton Park case remains unchallenged, or the law as to “persons using” unaltered, will still leave all British sport grounds open to the baneful influence of the bookmaker—indeed, as previously explained, every house, room, or enclosed place in the kingdom. The time will surely come when the nation will insist upon this scandal being removed. Reasons have been given for thinking that the House of Lords’ judgment in Powell v. Kempton Park cannot possibly be the right interpretation of the Act of 1853; and that it was differently interpreted by the racing world, and by the Jockey Club itself, even twenty years after it was passed, may be shown by here quoting from the notice in the Racing Calendar published in 1874: “It having come to the knowledge of the Stewards of the Jockey Club that betting for ready money in the ring ... has taken place at Newmarket, they hereby give notice that no such illegal betting is permitted either in the enclosures or any part of their property at Newmarket.” Thus in 1874 deposit-taking by bookmakers was held to be illegal, for it is quite impossible that the notice refers to persons in authority and control, as Lord Halsbury now says the persons using are, for the controllers were the stewards themselves or their managers, and these managers are separately provided for in the Act. When it is determined to suppress professional betting the alteration in the wording of the Act need be only a simple one to free athletic sports of all kinds from the farce of the immunity of the proprietor as not betting but taking entrance fees, and of the bookmakers as betting but not being proprietors. But if the awful consequences following from the professional betting system were fully known, an Act making the calling itself entirely illegal would appeal strongly to the public conscience. To license them would be as bad as to return to the days of state lotteries, or to adopt the Continental plan of taking special taxes in commutation of the offences of those who trade upon other vices.

Miscellaneous Gambling

N. Gambling in the Stock, Produce, and other Markets

When in any system of business the element of commerce and gambling are inextricably mixed, it is wise to adopt a line of expediency. The gambler should at least pay the same dues as the genuine investor. To ensure this no contract should be made enforceable or legal unless made upon Government stamped paper. The real buyer of £500 would not complain of having to pay 2s. or say 1s. per £100 to the National Exchequer; but the dealers in a £2,000,000 gambling contract would think twice before incurring a first definite outlay of £2000 or even £1000 cash down. A similar regulation would be desirable for the Produce, etc., Exchanges. In this way, by a perfectly equitable legal enactment, the wings of outrageous speculation would be clipped. An additional improvement would be an extension to all stocks and shares upon the lines of the principles of the Bank Act 1867, 30 Vict., c. 29. Prior to its passing, gambling in the shares of Banks had become a scandal, and a danger to credit. It provided for contracts setting forth the distinctive numbers of Bank shares, so as to prevent sales of shares of which the sellers were not possessed. In the produce markets similar requirements could be insisted on to bring about a corresponding result.

N. Industrial Gaming unconnected with Trade

Illegal Games.—The legislative remedy here should be to abolish the old interdict of certain special games, and to make all games of combined skill and chance illegal when played for money. But this would be a counsel of perfection which, in the present state of public opinion, would have no chance of being carried out. If, however, the words were added, “by players of unequal experience and skill,” it would give the Courts power to penalise the rooks in all such glaring cases as their victims should place in the hands of the authorities. Nor does there seem to be any reason why the old idea of restrictions as to amount should not be made good use of. There would be an enormous balance of advantage if it were declared illegal for a person to obtain during any one day a sum exceeding £10 by gaming, or for minors to gamble at all. The flocks of pigeons would to some extent be protected, however little the rook minority liked it, and society should benefit in every way. Such a regulation would sweep away the scandalous immunity enjoyed by rich men’s clubs; and, considering the widespread ruin for which they are responsible, and the present disgraceful unfairness of the law as between the poor and the wealthy, its application should work an incalculable improvement.

Playing with Gaming-Machines.—The Courts now seem disposed to construe the question of a modicum of skill more severely in this connection as children are so largely affected, and from what has been said above it may be hoped that the automatic machines are doomed. The above remarks, however, with regard to combined skill and chance and restriction of amount, apply here also to a certain extent, especially with regard to their use in clubs. The difficulties will be great of applying such regulations to gambling in private houses until the moral sense of the community becomes more keenly alive to the penalties of sorrow, ruin, and degradation which are the sad sequel of its neglect.

Lotteries and Sweepstakes.—The Lottery Acts now existing might have been fairly efficient if it were not for the difficulty, delay, and expense in having to obtain in certain cases the leave of the Attorney-General before proceedings can be taken. This especially applies in the matter of newspapers which benefit by advertising the lotteries. They are protected by 8 & 9 Vict. c. 74, the provision in which needs modification. There is still much, however, to be desired in the efficiency of administration, which cannot be fully attained until the farcical practice of allowing the law to be broken for charitable purposes is given up. Some years ago the Scotch authorities openly stated in reply to a remonstrance that in such cases no interference would be made. This lache has been to a large extent followed in England, and when the National Anti-Gambling League pointed out to the late Mr. Adrian Hope, the Secretary for the Hospital for Sick Children in Great Ormond Street, that the great raffles intended to be held at the Coronation Bazaar at the London Botanical Gardens were in contravention of the law, he merely declined to drop them, and said that one of the Judges had bought the first ticket for the chief lottery. Questions had to be asked in the House of Commons before they could be stopped, after the illegality had been acknowledged by Ministers.

To sum up under this head, the Post Office should have increased powers and inducements to destroy lottery matter, and to confiscate and appropriate for the benefit of the Rowland Hill Memorial Fund, in which the Post Office is so much interested, all lottery remittances, whether British or foreign; the question of the Attorney-General’s fiat for prosecutions should be reconsidered; and the police authorities should be stimulated to institute a regular and impartial campaign. How grossly the weapons of the law in regard to lotteries have been neglected may be illustrated by a statement made in a Treasury prosecution at Clerkenwell Police Court in June 1904, to the effect that one of the most important statutes, 4 Geo. IV. c. 60, was extremely difficult to find, not being printed in the ordinary book of statutes, and was not found in any magisterial text-book.

Press Competitions and Coupon Gambling.—So numerous are the devices of the baser organs of the press, and even of some which find it difficult to hold out against their competition, that no reform of the law is likely to be effective without some enactment making the offering of prizes illegal beyond a certain small amount; which compromise can hardly be avoided, because the best of these newspaper competitions offer undoubtedly some educational inducements. Those which are merely gambling vehicles should be suppressed. The bad position here again rests upon the foolish old dictum as to a modicum of skill covering a quantity of gambling. For instance, an unfortunate decision of the High Court in Hall v. Cox (1 Q.B. 1899), held that guesses at the numbers of the next Registrar-General’s return (although any competitor could purchase any quantity of the newspaper, filling in a different number for each one, thus making it an extensive gamble at will) did not constitute a lottery, because a certain amount of skill could be exercised by the study of previous returns. This led to numerous imitations, one of which was guessing at the future circulation of a paper, which had the additional journalistic merit of acting as a good advertisement. Amongst many, one poor and foolish artisan acknowledged that he had purchased considerable numbers of the newspaper, and its great increase in circulation by the device shows how many credulous persons were willing to gamble under the shelter of the law.

Two brief sections should meet the difficulties under this heading:—

1. Make all such competitions in which there is a material element of chance illegal.

2. Make it illegal for any publication to offer in any one edition a prize or prizes of the aggregate value of more than £5 for any purpose whatever.

Gambling in Clubs.—With regard to the law as to betting in clubs, allusion has already been made to Downes v. Johnson (2 Q.B. 1895) and a recent decision of Mr. Justice Bucknill which appears to follow upon the lines of that most unfortunate and harmful judgment. The alteration of the law needed here (none should be needed but for the interpretation put upon the words “person using” and “any other person” in section 30 of the Betting Act of 1853, as meaning persons in authority in the place, in the Powell v. Kempton Park case) is to so alter the section that the proprietors or committee of a club shall not escape responsibility for individuals, like the bookmakers in a race-course ring, carrying on betting businesses. Merely a clear definition of “persons using” as including such individuals is needed. This would bring all these betting establishments, some of which merely pretend to be social clubs, into the category of betting-houses, which are common gaming-houses; and if this were supplemented by a section as previously suggested, following the idea of the statutes of Anne and 18 George II., making the gain by any one member of a club of a greater sum than £10, on any game or chance whatever, upon any particular day, an offence entailing the same consequences, a heavy blow would be struck at gambling clubs of all kinds.

As to other gaming in clubs, chiefly card-playing, the reader who plods through the long technical judgment of Mr. Justice Hawkins in Jenks v. Turpin (13 Q.B.D.) will be chiefly impressed by the feeling that the police authorities systematically fail to make use of the existing laws, which is indeed the fact; but this is owing in great measure to difficulties in obtaining evidence, and the natural reluctance to order raids while the gamesters have the power to retaliate in case of failure. When elaborate preparations have been made at the cost of much labour, time, and expense, heavy bribery will often obtain the needful warning even from within the police force. The great clubs are seldom or never touched, and until a special department is formed at Scotland Yard under an able and determined chief, with absolute power of instant dismissal and punishment and liberal reward in dealing with his subordinates, our social life will continue to be poisoned with the evils of club gambling. If this were done and the old £10 limit named above once more revived, and greater power conferred to punish the players as well as the club committees and proprietors, club gambling would dwindle and the career of the professional gamester become less profitable and more precarious, while fortunes and incomes now thrown away would be applied to fruitful and honest purposes.

Petty Gambling.—In the matter of petty gambling what is needed is not so much amendments of the law (the enormous demand for playing-cards seems, indeed, to make the reimposition of a tax advisable) as its assiduous application by the authorities. It is now so diffused, unhappily owing in great part to the habit the nation has fallen into of looking upon gambling as a venial vice, if vice at all, that their task may well seem endless; and in this connection the most effective legislative enactment, for petty gambling is very widespread amongst juveniles, might well be some considered scheme compulsorily providing for teaching the young in primary and secondary schools how wrong it is and what evils it leads to. The materials exist for enabling this to be done in a very incisive manner, and by the time such systematic lessons have permeated the rising generation their elders may become as ashamed of indulging in betting and gambling as they may now be said to be of drunkenness.

The Press and Gambling

It remains to say a few words about the press, which is largely responsible for the great evils of gambling, particularly of the professional betting system, under the plea of devotion to sport, which even the Duke of Devonshire seems to consider is being overdone, according to a recent speech made by him in public. The prohibition of the betting odds was strongly urged upon the Select Committee of the House of Lords. It would be a fatal blow to bookmaking, for nine bets out of ten are now made without agreement with the bookmakers as to the figures, but depending upon their subsequent publication as reported from the starting-post. The betting men put forward advocates before the Committee who pretended to think that such legislation would not reduce betting, but the best test is the frantic opposition which the bookmakers offer to the proposition. It is earnestly advocated by men like Mr. Le Blanc Smith of Oxford University and others interested in the purity of sport. The Committee say in their Report on Betting (Report and Evidence, No. 389, 1902; Evidence, No. 370, 1901; Index, 173 and 114, 1902): “There can be little doubt that the almost universal practice of publishing in newspapers what are known as ‘Starting-Price Odds’ greatly facilitates betting upon horse-races”; but, as they considered it to be in the nature of news, and a protection against fraud, they were not prepared to recommend the suggestion. It may be pointed out, however, that although no doubt the odds published are often correct, there is a regular system arranged between the bookmakers and the baser press organs for quoting unreal odds to lure on the public, which was exposed three years ago in an amusing controversy between two London newspapers. Moreover, the prevention of the swindling of some of the foolish public by bookmakers seems a poor reason for permitting the continuation of a practice which so materially assists in the demoralisation of hundreds of thousands of the populace. Considerable pains have been taken to ascertain privately the feeling of the better class of newspapers upon this subject, and it is found that they would welcome such a prohibition, provided it be made universal, as it will actually benefit all respectable journals. Their circulation is reduced by the public being led to spend their “press money” upon the so-called sporting or betting papers, the number of which is legion, many of them making great incomes of thousands per annum; besides which a considerable number of the less respectable newspapers issue during the racing seasons editions printed literally for nothing beyond the result of horse-races, and in the winter of football matches, the ordinary matter which has remained in type enabling them to escape from the meshes of the new bye-laws as to publications consisting wholly or chiefly of sporting—betting—information. Parliament will have to make up its mind some day to deal with this aspect of the betting question, and to say that the liberty of the press is not liberty to debauch the public and to share in the proceeds of doing so; that if Lord Beaconsfield was right, in his time, in stigmatising the Turf as a vast engine of national demoralisation, and if its powers for evil are now far greater than in his days, the press shall not continue to bolster up the system by publishing the odds, and sharing in its ill-gained profits through the medium of advertisements.

Conclusion

In conclusion, it may be said that when such time arrives the conviction will also be held by the people of the United Kingdom that the professional gambler in the stock and produce markets, whose operations it is not always possible to challenge as being entirely unconnected with commerce, should at least have his huge dealings hampered by a pro rata tax, the incidence of which would not interfere with bona fide purchases and sales; that our police forces must be saved from becoming as corrupt as Tammany Hall through bookmakers’ bribes, to which several of them are well on the way; that the great Department of the Post Office must not continue to swell its revenues by using its organisation to assist the corrupt business of betting, even granting it special facilities, whatever may be alleged to the contrary—in particular, with regard to the telegraphic service, in which overt temptations to the servants in its employ are continually resulting in its having to prosecute them in batches, notably the younger ones among them, in the name of public morality, but practically for the protection of this bookmaking system which the Post Office, as its intermediary for deposits, assists and fosters in its work of breeding criminals and cheating fools; and finally that those individuals who, without the vestige of any mercantile basis, prey upon the credulity and vices of their fellow-countrymen should be looked upon as hostes humani generis, so that the bookmakers shall be treated as criminals and punished, not by fines but by imprisonment.

Then, perhaps, also, the habitual private gambler of means and position will find every public career and honour withheld from him, and this great Christian nation will approach the plane of morality now occupied in this respect by our allied heathen empire of Japan.