450 



BETTING HOUSES. 



No house, &c. 

 to be kept for 

 purpose of 

 owner, cSic. 

 betting with 

 other persoue. 



Betting houses 

 to be gaming 



" Such, was the business, and it was confined chiefly to 

 offices or houses. It was found that those offices or houses 

 had a tendency to bring many persons to ruin, and 

 especially to lead clerks and servants to spend money in 

 gambling. It was for the suppression of that class of 

 betting that the Act was passed. The preamble of it states 

 exactly what the Legislature desired to suppress." 



The Act is entitled, "An Act for the Suppression of Bet- 

 ting Houses," and recites that "a kind of gaming has of late 

 sprung up tending to the injury and demoralisation of impro- 

 \'ident persons by the opening of places called betting houses 

 or offices, and the receiving of money in advance by the 

 owners or occupiers of such houses or offices, or by other 

 persons acting on their behalf, on their premises to pay 

 money on events of horse races and the like contingencies." 

 This preamble is repealed by the Statute Law Revision 

 Act, 1892 {d), but such repeal is not to affect the construc- 

 tion of the Act (c), and it may, therefore, still be referred 

 to for such purpose. 



For the suppression of such places, the statute 16 & 17 

 Vict. c. 119, s. 1, enacts that "no house, office, room, or 

 other place shall be opened, kept, or used for the purpose 

 of the owner, occupier, or keeper thereof, or any person 

 using the same, or any person procured or employed by or 

 acting for or on behalf of such owner, occupier, or keeper, 

 or person using the same, or of any person using the same, 

 or of any person having the care or management or in any 

 manner conducting the business thereof, betting with persons 

 resorting thereto ; or for the purpose of any money or 

 valuable thing being received by or on behalf of such 

 owner, occupier, keeper, or person as aforesaid, as or for 

 the consideration for any assurance, undertaking, promise, 

 or agreement, express or implied, to pay or give thereafter 

 any money or valuable thing, on any event or contingency 

 of or relating to any horse race, or other race, fight, game, 

 sport, or exercise, or as or for the consideration for securing 

 the paying or giving by some other person of any money 

 or valuable thing, on any such event or contingency as 

 aforesaid ; and every house, office, room, or other place 

 opened, kept, or used for the purposes aforesaid, or any of 

 them, is hereby declared to be a common nuisance and 

 contrary to law." 



By s. 2, every house, room, office, or place opened, kept. 



{d) 



& 56 Yict. c. 19. 



(«) Ibid. s. 1. 



