Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!clyde.concordia.ca!uunet!mailrus!accuvax.nwu.edu!nucsrl!telecom-request
From: wmartin@stl-06sima.army.mil (Will Martin)
Newsgroups: comp.dcom.telecom
Subject: Phone Calls and Stamps as Lottery Fees
Message-ID: <5384@accuvax.nwu.edu>
Date: 19 Mar 90 18:55:46 GMT
Sender: news@accuvax.nwu.edu
Organization: TELECOM Digest
Lines: 39
Approved: Telecom@eecs.nwu.edu
X-Submissions-To: telecom@eecs.nwu.edu
X-Administrivia-To: telecom-request@eecs.nwu.edu
X-Telecom-Digest: Volume 10, Issue 187, Message 3 of 8


>[Moderator's Note: The fallacy in your argument is that charging for a
>phone call to reach the radio station lottery is violating rules
>pertaining to contests. Contests which have you mail in a coupon or
>ticket are not violating the law because the post office requires a stamp
>on the envelope. Both the postage stamp and the telephone charge are
>simply fees for transporting the message.  PT]

Don't be so sure about this -- up until fairly recently (mid '60's or
early '70's, I believe), a lot of nationwide contests or sweepstakes
were illegal in Missouri, and void in this state, because the official
State Attorney General legal opinion on the issue was that *the stamp
on the envelope* needed to enter the contest was a payment, which made
the contest a lottery then illegal under state law. 

It wasn't until a state constitutional amendment was passed that
permitted the state lottery to be begun that this situation changed. I
recall quite clearly a lot of otherwise-nationwide contests that had
"void in Missouri" [and some other states] in the fine print because
of this, and the subject showed up now and then in newspaper advice
columns and consumer articles.

Some states still have some provisions in their laws that help their
citizens in this respect. I think Vermont is one of them; you'll see a
note in the fine print of contest rules regarding sending for an entry
blank or the like that residents of all states *except Vermont* [or
whatever state this really is, if not Vermont] have to send a
self-addressed stamped envelope. Residents of Vermont [or whereever]
need only send a self-addressed envelope with no stamp on it.

Back then, calling Long Distance was still a big deal, so I think
there were few, if any, contests that required entry by calling
outside a local area. I tend to think that the mindset that called the
stamp an illegal lottery payment would view the cost of toll calls the
same way.


Regards, Will
wmartin@st-louis-emh2.army.mil OR wmartin@stl-06sima.army.mil