COMMENTARY: A chance for common sense to cool America’s gambling fever

c. 1996 Religion News Service (Robert F. Drinan is a Jesuit priest, former member of Congress and professor of law at Georgetown University Law Center). (WASHINGTON) For more than a century, gambling was banned throughout the United States. But today, there are only two states _ Utah and Hawaii _ where it is forbidden. Sadly […]

c. 1996 Religion News Service

(Robert F. Drinan is a Jesuit priest, former member of Congress and professor of law at Georgetown University Law Center).

(WASHINGTON) For more than a century, gambling was banned throughout the United States. But today, there are only two states _ Utah and Hawaii _ where it is forbidden. Sadly for America, gambling has become a way of life.


Last year, members of 154 million American households visited casinos. The $40 billion they spent on roulette, poker, slot machines, blackjack and other games of chance far outweighed what was spent on symphony concerts and football games combined.

While state governments have benefitted from revenues generated by gambling operations nationwide, what toll has gambling taken on the human spirit, on families and on communities?

We are about to find out.

Thanks to a recent act of Congress, a new, bipartisan commission on gambling will be in operation by the end of the year. The commission will have nine members, three appointed each by the president, the Senate and the House of Representatives.

They have a formidable task. For the next two years, the commission will gather testimony on the economic and human impact of gambling on American society.

The commission is charged with pulling together accurate information about the explosive growth of the gambling industry. It will explore business issues, such as the new companies that manufacture”one-armed bandits”and other electronic gambling equipment as well as the economic impact of gambling revenue on communities.

But one of the most fascinating aspects of the commission’s work will be what it may discover about the psychological and social impact of gambling’s core belief: that a roll of the dice or the pull of a slot-machine handle can make an ordinary person an instant millionaire.

Is this a harmless fantasy or does it lead to a dangerous addiction?

Surprisingly, there is little credible empirical evidence on this issue. One study performed after Iowa legalized riverboat gambling indicated that 5.4 percent of the state’s adults became”pathological gamblers,”unable to control their impulses or their finances.


Indian tribal casinos _ now operating in 22 states _ have brought billions of dollars of revenue to once-impoverished tribes. But the moral and social impact on tribal culture of this strange phenomenon is yet to be determined.

More research needs to be done. And more experts need to be consulted. As the commission does its work, expect to hear not only from social scientists, but also from special interest groups like the non-profit National Coalition Against Legalized Gambling, an organization whose members span the political spectrum from conservative to liberal, all united in their opposition to gambling. The gambling industry lobby, the American Gaming Association, also can be expected to speak with a loud voice at commission hearings.

Expect, too, religious groups to seek opportunities to testify before the commission, from the conservative Christian Coalition and Focus on the Family to the liberal National Council of Churches. These groups often are on opposite sides of the fence politically, but all have voiced reservations about the ill-effects of gambling.

For 200 years in America, government and religious authorities have urged citizens to lead virtuous lives and to resist the attractions of alcohol, drugs and tobacco.

It seems clear to me that even though states and local governments stand to gain millions in revenue from lotteries and casinos, they should not themselves be in the business of enticing people to gamble.

It cannot be said that legalized gambling is an innocent game of diversion like church bingo. It is a hardball endeavor designed to extract millions from naive individuals who have been persuaded to put their paychecks at risk for a chance to hit the jackpot.


A recent article in the conservative Economist magazine points out that deception is inherent in most forms of gambling. If consumers were legally entitled to receive all possible information about the odds against winning a game of chance, says the Economist, most would not play.

That’s the kind of common-sense information the commission on gambling needs to bring to the attention of the American people. I can only hope that the hearings will shed the light of reasonable thinking on an insidious system in which the American people are invited by their governments to spend billions on the fantasy that they can get rich quick.

MJP END DRINAN

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