The Feilding Star. SATURDAY, JANUARY 18, 1890 Too Much Racing

Feilding Star, Volume XI, Issue 88, 18 January 1890, Page 2

The Feilding Star. SATURDAY, JANUARY 18, 1890 Too Much Racing

4» Wb learn from our Northern cxi changes that it is probable a Jockey Club will be formed at Patea shortly, ; and that their first meeting will be I held ou Easter Monday. We do not pretend to dictate to any settlement 3 whether the residents should or should i nothaye a Jockey Club if they like ; but still we object to" the multipiiear tion of race meetings on this coast. We have far too many of them already, and .it would be hard to say wkich of them are got up ia the interests of legitimate sport, or which for , the totalisator money. As an assistant to genuine raciug clubs we think the totalisator has been of cousider- - able benefit; but* where races are promoted for the profit derived from the totalisator only, -re disapprove altogether. Be it understood that tbis remark is general only, and is not - intended to apply particularly to the > proposed club at Patea. That the f attention of Parliament should soon be directed to the evil spirit now i rampart in the colony of gambling in . connection with racing, is an admitted s necessity, and when the subject is . taken up then it will not be as in the past by the so-called " goody-goody " 3 faction, whose advocacy of a measure, however useful it may be, is too often so indiscreet as to secure its condemnation, but by stroag-miuded, hard- , headed men of the world, who can take common sense and practical views i of the social injuries committed by giving legislative encouragement to a mode of gambling which is a crime when committed without the aid of a 3 " machine." There will be no half measures then, and the totalisator will - be swept away as it were by the I stroke of a pen, and its place will 7 know it no more. That people will gamble, and that all the legal enactments ever made by the most astute legislators born or to be born into the world, will not prevent them, and there will be gambling to the end of ' the chapter, we are perfectly awaiv, but the same rule will apply to mm i der aud every other crime against the decalogue, yet such offences will be ' always punishable, while the fear of consequences will then, as now, exercise a greater or less restraining influ- • ence over the minds htkl consciences of the otherwise probable offenders While stringent laws prevent the committal of much crime, yet the lack of opportunities prevent far more ; f therefore, that being admitted, the lessening of the number of race meetr. ings must effect a proportionate dimmution in tbe amount of gambling indulged in. If those who are fond . of racing would ouly be content and "let well alone," they are not likely ■ to be interefered with, but when they become a nuisance they must be dealt with accordingly.