--- title: Improvement Era description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930. authors: - Bennion, Milton collections: - periodicals tags: - magazine - improvement-era periodical: Improvement Era volume: 15 number: 6 published: 1912-04 publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations publisher_place: Salt Lake City language: en type: magazine reference: 'Bennion, Milton, "The Church and the Lottery," *Improvement Era* 15, no. 6 (April 1912): 521–523.' source: url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera1506unse transcription: Transcribed from the Internet Archive scan of each issue (the item for each issue is named in the issue's own source); unnumbered advertising leaves are omitted, printed page numbers are kept as page markers. identifier: improvementera1506unse start_page: 521 end_page: 523 rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1912-04) source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera1506unse publication_year: 1912 note: The Internet Archive item metadata carries a blanket "© Copyright by Intellectual Reserve, Inc." notice. The library owner judged it inapplicable because this issue was published in 1912, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright. --- # The Church and the Lottery The Church and the Lottery BY MILTON BENNION, PROFESSOR OF PHILOSOPHY, UNIVERSITY OF UTAH. Any form of gambling has a great fascination for the ordinary human mind. Savages become addicted to the habit as readily as Chinese become opium fiends. There are perhaps two main reasons why games of chance are so attractive. One is the desire to get something valuable for nothing, an immoral development of property instinct the other is the desire for excitement, ; something to keep the nervous system in a high state of tension. The latter type of desire is also manifest in the popularity of any sort of thrilling contest or exhibition —prize fight, bull fight, or any spectacular and apparently dangerous performance. When well developed, the desire for something of this sort becomes a mental disease. In the history of European people, since the time of the Roman Emperor, Augustus, the lottery has been one of the most common forms of appealing to the gambling instinct. The practice is said to have developed under Augustus in his custom "of distributing at his feasts sealed pockets, similar in appearance, but containing orders for articles of very different values" — a practice akin to the modern fish pond, so popular with children. .Since Roman times, the lottery has frequently been used by governments as a means of raising money to build churches, colleges, and charitable institutions. The practice was very popular in America in the eighteenth century. Nearly a century ago, however, there came a powerful reaction against this practice. It was prohibited by law in England and France, before the middle of the nineteenth century. In America it was made illegal by one state after another, until it is now practically wiped out as a legalized activity. Late in the nineteenth century the Federal government gave the practice a hard blow by forbidding the use of the mails by lottery companies. The matter was discussed by Benjamin Harrison in one of his : 522 IMPROVEMENT ERA messages to Congress, in no uncertain language, as the following quotations will show The people of all the states are debauchsd and defrauded.* * * * * The use of the mails by these companies is a prostitution of an agency only intended to serve the purposes of a legitimate trade and a decent intercourse. ****** not necessary, I am sure, for me to attempt to portray the It is robbery of the poor, and the widespread corruption of public and private morals which are necessary incidents of these lottery schemes.' In more recent times, other forms of gambling have flourished from time to time, such as cards, bookmaking on horse races, roulette wheels, pools, pots, and what not, all of which have been prohibited by law in many states of the Union. In American cities the suppression of gambling is always one of the hardest problems of the police department. The suppression of candy raffles, and other forms of the gamling art that appeal to children, is now one of the problems of the Juvenile court. Thus far, these officers of the law have, apparently, assumed that they had need only to watch the saloons and gambling resorts for instances of violation of the law. Recently some attention has been given to some of the merchants, but it remains yet to enforce the law in the churches. Or shall the churches claim a monopoly of this vice? Shall they alone be exempt from prosecution in order that they may reap a few dollars with which to reclaim the souls they by this means tend to corrupt? Can an institution whose chief business it is to save souls afford to resort to any means the tendency of which is to destroy souls? It is perhaps needless to say, as an item of news, that there has been a recent epidemic of church fairs, a marked characteristic of which has been an appeal to the gambling instinct in some form. Raffling, guessing games with chances to win or lose, and betting on contests, are symptoms characteristic of the malady. To these may be added penny votes for queen, or for the most popular lady; or possibly some other scheme to get money out of people who, persumably, are otherwise unwilling to donate to the church. In denfense of these practices, it is sometimes said that the money is not given because of the gambling element involved, or the appeal to vanity in the voting contest, but simply as a donation to the church, or to charity. If this were the case it would be ; THE CHURCH AND THE LOTTERY 523 good buisness policy to collect the money ciirtctly as donations, and sell, on business principles, the articles donated to the fair. This would bring, in the aggregate, more money than is raised by the methods described above. The fact that objectionable methods are used is practically an admission that appeal is made to the gambling instinct in order to increase the revenues. If this is legitimate on the ground that the end justifies the means, it must be noted, in the first place, that the managers of the fair are looking at the wrong end —placing money above character the latter is valuable as an end, the former is only a means. But, from another point of view, should we accept the justification offered, what is the logical consequence? Might not the money harvest be increased by dispensing intoxicants at the fair? This would doubtless attract the saloon element who, under the stimulus of wine as well as games of chance, would readily part with their coins. We do not question the motives of those responsible for the methods so frequently used at church fairs. We think, however, that in their efforts to raise money they have failed to see the possible consequence of the methods employed. When children are urged at the fair to do things that parents warn them against, or absolutely forbid, there is produced an estranged relation between the church and the home, instead of mutual support in the great problem of moral and religious education. In the long run this is bound to count against the church. It tends to drive away the support that is of most worth to the church. And, if the games of chance attract to the church young people who would not otherwise come, what has it done for them? Is the influence of the games leading to the spiritual life, or to something quite the reverse ?