Page:Harvard Law Review Volume 9.djvu/418

390 390 HARVARD LAW REVIEW. the Session of the Legislative Body of the i6th June, 1868, the opposition, represented by the Lanjuinais deputies, Marie and Jules Favre, vigorously resisted the bill which was to authorize the Company of Suez to issue lottery bonds. By the overwhelming majority of 183 votes to 8, the Legislative Body adopted the measure. But one cannot draw any exact legal significance from this vote, for, by reason of the subtlety of the debaters of the government, it was impossible to decide whether the Legislative Body, in granting its sanction, with this authoritative interpreta- tion of the law of 1836, had decided that the law was not applicable to lottery loans, or if, adopting the contrary position, it granted its sanction because the undertaking under consideration deserved to have the prohibition of this rigorous law removed. To-day, however, in France the controversy has subsided. It is unanimously admitted that the issue of lottery bonds is a transac- tion falling under the jurisdiction of the law of 1836. This po- sition, affirmed by a celebrated decision of the Cour de Cassation, in 1876,^ by the government in 1877,^ and by most writers, was definitively established by the French Parliament in a striking manner in 1888. This decision, in short, authorized the Company of the Interoceanic Canal of Panama to issue lottery bonds by express infringement of the law of 1836.^ It is therefore admitted in France that no issue of lottery bonds can take place without special sanction by the legislative power. This position is justified by the text of the law; there can be no doubt that the issue of lottery bonds is one of those transactions offered to the public to arouse the hope of gain acquired by lot. The contrary could not be seriously maintained, and in fact has never been used as argument. If from France we pass to the other countries of Europe, we see that the same conditions prevail everywhere, with one exception. In all countries except Spain the issue of lottery bonds is assumed to fall under the prohibition of lotteries. In Germany the state lottery has been in existence in most of the states, notably in 1 Cour de Cassation, Criminal Chamber, 14th January, 1876. 2 Decision of the Minister of Justice, dated 8th June, 1877, forbidding the advertise- ment of foreign lottery loans and the publication o£ the lists of drawings. 8 Article 4 of the law of the 8th July, 1888, ordains tlvat all prospectuses, publications, bonds, etc, published by the Company of Panama bear the notice, " Loan authorized in accordance with the law of the 21st May, 1836, by the luw of the 8th June, 1888."