Uncle Sam, Trustee
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"The result of each day's drawing will also be given to the press to be published as a matter of news." |
"Nor shall any newspaper, circular, pamphlet, or publication of any kind . . . containing any list of prizes awarded at the drawings of any such lottery or gift enterprise, whether said list is of any part or of all of the drawing, be carried in the mail." |
Possibly there is some technical evasion of liability under the law; but who will say that the spirit of the law was not violated? The United States postal laws, and the several State laws directed against games of chance, do not presume fraud; they aim to protect the people from the demoralization that comes from tempting offers of opportunity to get something at less than its value,—something for nothing.
The effect on the people of this "circular . . . offering prizes dependent upon lot or chance" can be readily guessed. Relieved of apprehension as to life and limb, guaranteed "fairness and equality of opportunity" in a simple game of chance where the turn of a card meant hundreds, or thousands—or nothing—the gambling spirit was aroused as the Louisiana lottery never aroused it. By hundreds from the Eastern States, by thousands from the Central West, men flocked into South Dakota to "play the game" with Uncle Sam. Nearly three weeks
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