BOOKMAKERS ENCOURAGED.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LV, Issue 224, 10 February 1913, Page 7

BOOKMAKERS ENCOURAGED.

INCITJNG YOI'NG MEN TO GAMBLE. POSTAL SERVICE ACCUSED OF AIDING AND ABETTING. Coinmeu' ing editorially on the business si ill iK'iiiii' <•<»)!(!in'tod by bookmakers, the Christ elmrcli Press says:—"We regret to say thai we have evidence before us showing that the Postmaster-General is aiding and abetting (lie bookmakers ill nli'ering incil I'liieiil s lo young men to gamble oil horse-racing, irrespective of I the totali-ator. We iiave before us bookmakers' cards offering odds up to as .much a- KMIO to I on various racing 'doubles.' Th"se cards -were posted in unsealed envelopes and addressed to youths in city ollices who, we are assured. are under twenty-one years of age. They have hecii accepted in bulk and stamped bv the Po*t Office, and bear a notilicatii >:i that if they are unclaimed they arc to be returned to a certain box at the General Post Office. Tt appears, therefore, that the Post Office is freilitatin" the bookmakers' operations by giving them a private box, conveying their betting cards through the mail, and accepting these documents and stamping them in bulk to further lighten the labor of the senders. . . . We certainly think the law ought to be altered so that all bookmakers might be put on the list of those whose correspondence is prohibited from being sent through the post. No private letter-box should be allotted to a bookmaker, a,nil we think that power should be given to a postmaster to stop letters suspected to contain incitements to betting and forward them to Wellington so that they may be opened to headquarters and their delivery stopped if the suspicion is proved to be correct."