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It's Past Time to Ban Amateur Sports Gambling
August 1, 2001
The Hill
By Senator John S. McCain
August 1, 2001
"Sports wagering threatens the integrity of sports, it puts student athletes in a vulnerable position, it can serve as a gateway behavior for adolescent gamblers and it can devastate individuals and careers." These are the words of the congressionally-appointed National Gambling Impact Study Commission (NGISC), which conducted an analysis of the social and economic impacts of legal gambling in America. In June 1999, the NGISC recommended that "betting on collegiate and amateur athletic events that is currently legal be banned altogether." The Amateur Sports Integrity Act (S. 718) does just that.
In 1992, Congress recognized the federal interest in protecting sports and athletes from the harmful effects of gambling, and prohibited state-sanctioned sports betting in the overwhelming majority of states. Although Congress "grandfathered" a handful of states at that time, only Nevada has chosen to permit legal gambling on college sports. Until last year, however, when it changed its law in response to charges of gross hypocrisy, Nevada did not allow gambling on Nevada college teams-- it only countenanced gambling on young athletes from every other state.
Although betting on amateur sports is legal only in Nevada, its impacts are felt throughout the country. Not only does the Las Vegas betting clearinghouse send a confusing message about the propriety and legality of amateur sports gambling, the publication throughout the country of Las Vegas-generated point spreads fuels illegal gambling in the judgment of the NGISC, and steals victories from young athletes who manage to beat their opponents but not the spread.
In deciding whether or not to support S. 718, consider who supports or opposes it, and the motivations of each. The Amateur Sports Integrity Act has received overwhelming support from college coaches and officials who have seen first-hand the harm that gambling has on their charges. What has motivated these educators to rally behind the bill, to testify for it, and to travel to Capitol Hill last month to urge its passage? They have no interest other than a concern for our youth and the integrity of amateur sports.
I have been struck by coaches' descriptions of the impacts gambling has had on their students and on themselves. Coaches like Lou Holtz and Congressman Tom Osborne have described being heckled by crowds and receiving death threats for winning games but failing to cover the spread.
With the overwhelming support of those who are most familiar with the problems associated with amateur sports gambling, passage of S. 718 should be a given. Not so. Why? This brings us to the bill's opponents, their motivations, and their methods. In a March 2001 report, Public Citizen concluded that legislation to ban gambling on amateur sports, which has twice been reported out of the Commerce Committee, has been blocked by the flow of soft money contributions from the gaming industry to both political parties. Both parties have chosen, Public Citizen suggested, to trade a measure that can help protect our youth and maintain the integrity of amateur sports, for financial contributions in the last election cycle and the promise of more soft money to come.
What about opponents' claims that by banning gambling in Nevada, we are eliminating the effective "policing" function that casinos perform when they look for anomalous betting patterns to determine whether a game has been fixed, and that we'll cause an explosion of illegal gambling? Give me a break. There is no evidence that Nevada casinos have ever prevented a point-shaving incident. Moreover, stopping legalized betting is far more likely to stem illegal gambling than to fuel it. The NGISC concluded as much when it observed, "legal sports wagering – especially the publication in the media of Las Vegas and off-shore generated point spreads – fuels a much larger amount of illegal sports wagering." Former Notre Dame football star, Kevin Pendergast, who served time in prison for his orchestration of a point-shaving scheme involving the Northwestern University basketball team, insists that, "Without Nevada, without the option of betting in Nevada, the Northwestern basketball point-shaving scandal would not have occurred."
The Senators from Nevada, who cannot be faulted for their able efforts on behalf of their constituents, have sought to derail S. 718 by introducing a separate bill that they claim targets the real problem of illegal gambling. While I agree that we need also to address illegal gambling, I think they have put the cart before the horse. Let's first change the law to send a uniform message that gambling on amateur sports is wrong, then work on prosecuting those who break it.
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