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RACING OF BENEFIT TO WINDSOR Leading Daily of Canadian City Makes Protest Against Passage of the Miller Bill Windsor Out March 21 The Evening Record Windsors leading daily Is out with a strong edi ¬ torial in opnosition to the passage of the Miller anti betting hill in the course of which reference is made to the attitude of the business interests of Windsor towards racing and credit is given the sport as being stimulative of every line of trade in the community The editorial is couched In tlie following language languageThe The Miller bill consideration of which has been deferred in the House of Commons until after Eitster is a measure with some commendable features but it must be generally admitted that it is too drastic in some of its provisions There seems no doubt that tlie promoters of the legislation Mr Miller is only the instrument in certain hands have undertaken the task of reform in somu haste and their arguments indicate that their facts have Itoon poorly digested Men who undertake to attack social or other abuses owe It to themselves and the public that they movo ouly after the fullest investigation In seeking to effect a change of laws especially they owe both to parliament and the community the obligation at ¬ taching to every citizen undertaking a similar task of mastering existing conditions of understanding the existing law and of making clear to par ¬ liament the existence of grave abuses and point ¬ ing out the most practical and effective manner of curtailing those abuses with as little disturbance as may bo to any lawabiding and respectable sec ¬ tion communityThis of the community This precaution Messrs Shearer and Raney tins men prominently connected with this movement seem to have neglected IRcv Mr Shearer as a clergy ¬ man should have been esj ecially methodical and wellinformed In taking this procedure His profes ¬ sional status as a minister of the gqspel certainly did not free him from the obligation to know what he was talking about and to inform himself on the sub ¬ ject of the proposed legislation before undertaking to move parliament The evidence quoted in the ar ¬ gument filed before the committee would tend to show that Dr Shearer has undertaken to arouse an agitation against the racing interest without taking the trouble to learn tho facts and that In order to achieve his purposes he has not hesitated to make reckless and even unsupported statements and through his counsel to cast aspersions on some of the most reputable iucin1 crs of the community The matter is now in the hands of the peoples legislators and it Is to be hoped they will take a oroad and sane view of the whole question and not l lv v stampeded into Imposing legislation which will fail to carry out the objects of those in favor of it whilst on the other hand seriously damaging a great Industry of the country and an amusement which under proper safeguards should be a healthy recrea ¬ tion peopleEvils for the people Evils as they exist In all walks of life can sometimes by judicious legislation be regulated but not entirely suppressed without great Injustice and this method is what Is required in Canada so far as protracted race meetings are concerned Re llecting men who know of what they speak express the view that the most direct and effective way to ultimate reform would be to materially shorten the meetings as well of course to cut out some other admittedly objectionable features Were this done it is probable that public opinion would be satisfied to live and let live There is no doubt that all clubs have raced too much and some of them have far exceeded the limits of what should be a recrca tion and a healthy sport but no fairminded person can honestly say that that Is just and sufficient grounds for imiwsing legislation which will seri ¬ ously cripple a very important industry of Canada that of horsebreeding horsebreedingSo So far as concerns Windsor a place which has had a long and Intimate experience with the race track there arc no complaints Tho peace does not suffer to a noticeable extent from the peri ¬ odical presence of the vast racing colony and the business of the police court derives no stimulus there ¬ from On the contrary these events bring an im ¬ mense material benefit to the city stimulating every line of commerce and it Is doubtful if there is a business man In the city who would advocate aboli ¬ tion tionToronto Toronto Out iMarch 21 Tlie Canadian Sports ¬ man in its issue of today makes the following editorial comment setting forth in succinct fashion sane and sound reasons why the Miller bill should not be enacted by Parliament ParliamentThe The Canadian Thoroughbred Horse Society has issued a circular to the members of the House of Commons at Ottawa before whom will come the now celebrated Miller bill and if the members of the house are open to conviction there will bo something rotten in Denmark if the bill ever goes through for as the letter points out it has been proven conclusively That thoroughbred blood is essential to the light horse breeding of the country that it is necessary to test the thoroughbred on the race track for stamina constitution and those neces ¬ sary qualities that go to make a highclass race horse that unless opportunities to encourage the importing and breeding of thoroughbred stock in Canada in the way of race courses with sufficient prizes will be available for that purpose the breed ¬ ing and importing of the thoroughbred horse in Canada would cease that the liberty of betting not gambling is incidental to the sport and a necessary adjunct to many of those who at a cer ¬ tain time of tho year take tho recreation of attend ¬ ing the races that betting with a bookmaker who Is licensed and controlled by a chartered jockey club is the only proper safe and wellregulated method by which the public can be protected from fraud that if the Miller bill is adonted it will permit indiscriminate illicit and solicitating bookmakers operating everywhere and anywhere on the grounds of the jockey clubs whom it will be impossible to stop as has been the experience of the New Yort race courses that Mr Millers legislation if adopted will leave the public open to wagering with unlicensed and undesirable bookmakers who may pursue their vocation by underhanded methods and who would be in a position to defraud the suc ¬ cessful winner of his money that tho evidence sub ¬ mitted by those interested in tho standardbred is identically along the lines of that given by the thoroughbred horso witnesses with the exception that the industry is of a far greater magnitude which is quite true when one considers the large number of trotting meetings held throughout Can ¬ ada and in this connection the great northwest Manitoba Alberta and Saskatchewan have had but small opportunity in which to arrange to lie heard on so Important an industry to their country that tho duration of lengthy race meetings is undesirable is admitted anil as in some localities these meet ¬ ings have met with opposition on tlie part of the public a proposal to curtail such lengthy meetings would be highly desirable therefore instead of ab ¬ solute extinction a proper method of regulating same would be the object to be attained
