view raw text
CANADIAN DECISION WILL STAND. Efforts to Secure Anti-Betting Legislation Unlikely to Meet with Success. Inspector Archibald of the Toronto police force, who assumes the responsibility for the proceedings against bookmaking at Woodbine which came to a farcical end. in the Court of Appeals last week, assured an interviewer on Saturday that, as the law allowed betting on race courses in Canada, lie was going to have the law changed, says the Toronto Globe of last Monday. "I have no doubt that strong pressure will be brought to bear upon the government at the next session of Parliament to have legislation pissed so as to remedy-this strange state of affairs. . . . Why, the Kempton Park decision, which was that upon which the present judgment was based, upset a conviction gained on actions which were much less harmful to the community than those at the Woodbine. Both the present decision and previous judgments make it imperative that legislation be secured as soon as possible to cover the point." Possibly the inspector may be able to accomplish what he seeks, but, in the opinion of a gentleman who has had something to do with the legislation in this matter, the chance is a very small one. "It is not likely," said he, "that Parliament will abdicate its functions, or turn them over to a Toronto policeman. This is not a Toronto affair, you must understand, and the activity of a Toronto police otlicial will weigh very little with the gentlemen of the Senate and House of Commons of the Dominion of Canada. They will probably think they are better qualified to make the laws of the nation than he is, and certainly they were elected by the people for that purpose, while I am not aware of any public mandate to Inspector Archibald in the field of originating new or repealing existing legislation on any subject. It does not seem reasonable that what has been the law of the land for many years, and the operation of which in all that period has never brought forth the least objection from any of the 500 communities in which there are tracks, would be repealed on the application of a subordinate police official of Toronto. I know Parliament too well to entertain that idea for a moment. On the contrary, it will probably appear to Parliament, as it does to many thousands of his employers, the citizens of Toronto, that this is not his proper sphere of activity. When he is needed as a lawmaker he can be elected a member of Parliament or appointed a Senator. I recollect that a deputation went from Toronto a good many years ago to ask the then minister of justice Sir Ilihbert Tupper, it was to repeal the law confining betting to race courses, and legitimatizing it there. That had been made the law because in the best-digested legislation of all lands it has been considered the proper disposition of the question in the general interest. So the deputation were informed, and they were also informed that they presented no substantial reason for its repeal. Sir Ilihbert Tupper would not ask Parliament to make any change and that was the end of the agitation until the present situation. The dominant sentiment of the community is in favor of the present arrangement in every place in Canada where there is racing, from Halifax to Vancouver, and no deputation from Toronto, composed of gentlemen who have no knowledge or experience of the matter, but wliti" are simply opposed to it on principle, can prevail against public opinion. I can getyou eminently respectable deputations from Toronto this is the home realjy of more zealous meddlers with other peoples affairs than you can find in all the rest of Canada who would go to Ottawa and ask to have golf-playing, theater-going and practically every other form of amusement suppressed, because they are sincerely of opinion that these things are frivolous and wasteful of time and means that might be put to better advantage. So, a deputation does not necessarily mean much, and my experience is that unless it appears at Ottawa with some reasonable request, it does not accomplish much. No, I think you have heard the last of the attacks on race course betting for another long period, the length of which will depend practically on the maintenance of the high standard of government and discipline and the same regard for the public interest that prevail wherever there is organized racing in Canada, and that have brought it to the greatest strength and popularity it lias ever enjoyed." Deputy Attorney-General Cartwright, who presented the ease in the Court of Appeals was not nearly so profuse as the inspector in expressing an opinion of the situation. "I think it highly improper to state anything at the present time,? he stated emphatically.
