Legislators Betrayed State by Opposing Lottery Referendum

I don't buy the ones where you have to wait to see what numbers come up later that week, because I'm rarely around for that long. I buy the kind you scratch off with a penny. Instant gratification is the name of the game.

I can understand most of the arguments against starting a lottery in North Carolina. Detractors say it's a tax on the poor -- lottery tickets are disproportionately bought by the poorer elements of society. These people are the least likely to be able to afford the cost of the ticket but are the most likely to buy it.

And of course there are those who argue that a lottery would be immoral. We don't allow casino gambling, so why should we condone what is essentially gambling of another form? It's a good question. If we accept that the government can ban certain things, crack cocaine for example, because they hurt people, why shouldn't it ban lotteries, which might hurt people as well?

It seems that with so much wrong about a lottery, no reasonable person would want one. But to quote football announcer Lee Corso, "Not so fast, my friend." A couple of things should keep North Carolinians from dismissing a lottery out of hand.

For one thing, we need money. Lots of it. During the next few years, North Carolina will face budget shortfalls in the billions. That's with nine zeroes. Budget shortfalls are not academic; they do affect real people. The UNC-system Board of Governors and the UNC-Chapel Hill Board of Trustees, contrary to popular belief, do not raise tuition for fun.

In fact, there is a strong correlation between years in which the University's budget has been slashed to help the state make up its shortfall and years in which tuition is raised. When tuition is raised, fewer poor students can afford to go to school here -- or at any other system school for that matter. Though certainly not the only way, a lottery in which the proceeds fund education, especially scholarships, can be one method of ensuring poor students receive an education commensurate with their abilities, not their bank account.

Secondly, everyone else is doing it. Mothers don't like that argument. I can just hear mine saying, "If South Carolina jumped off the Empire State Building, would you do it too?" Well no, Mom, but this isn't the Empire State Building. North Carolinians are spending millions of dollars on the lotteries in South Carolina and Virginia. If our residents are going to spend money on lotteries, shouldn't they at least be spending it on a lottery that benefits North Carolina?

Short of building a wall around the state, we can't keep North Carolinians from throwing their money into South Carolina and Virginia. Since we're not worried about Ghengis Khan-style invaders, let's rule that out for now. That leaves us with instituting our own lottery.

You don't have to buy these pro-lottery ideas. The anti-lottery arguments are valid. And people on both sides genuinely want what's best for the state. Which is one reason it doesn't make sense that the legislature recently voted down a measure that would have placed the lottery on a non-binding referendum in the Nov. 5 election.

Non-binding means that no matter what, the ultimate say would have still rested with the legislature and the governor. The people merely wanted to have their say. Surely that's not too much to ask, especially on a matter that would have impacted just about every person in this state in his or her everyday life.

The fact that the Republicans, in a largely party-line vote, were able to defeat the referendum measure speaks to a troubling paternalism on their part. Not only does it seem that some of our state decision-makers are unwilling to let people decide issues for themselves, now they don't even want to hear what the people have to say.

E-mail Dan Harrison at dsharris@email.unc.edu.