CHAPTER II

there never was any chance of profit. My critics will say that such a comparison cannot hold, for in the lottery nothing was dealt in but gambling tickets, whereas the stock or bond certificate represents an ownership in the material things of the country. This is the fallacy the "System" spends millions every year to foster and disseminate. Between the two the difference is in favor of the Louisiana Lottery, for both are gambles and the lottery game was square. Those who ran it had for their trouble a fixed percentage of the profits, an enormous percentage, it is true, but the general fund was never encroached upon by the controllers. Who is to say what percentage the votaries of the "System" take in their game? It depends on how much their victims have to lose. The public have been persuaded, too, that in purchasing stocks they do not gamble, but only invest, or, at the worst, speculate, so they are deceived as well as plundered. A few millions each year satisfied the lottery owners; the votaries of the "System," among whom the "swag" must be divided, demand millions upon millions each. The tickets of the lottery had a definite value at all times until the drawing took place. The stocks and bonds of the