The Lottery reference article from the English Wikipedia on 24-Apr-2004
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Lottery

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A lottery, i.e. a drawing of lots for a prize, is a popular form of gambling. Some states, such as those under Islamic law, forbid it, while others condone it to the extent of organizing a national lottery.

Table of contents
1 Countries with a national lottery
2 Lottery in the United States
3 Lottery in France

Countries with a national lottery

etc.

Lotteries come in many formats. The prize can be fixed cash or goods. In this format there is risk to the organizer if insufficient tickets are sold. The prize can be a fixed percentage of the receipts. A popular form of this is the "50-50" draw where the organizers promise that the prize will be 50% of the revenue. The prize may be guaranteed to be unique where each ticket sold has a unique number. Many recent lotteries allow purchases to select the numbers on the lottery ticket resulting in the possibility of multiple winners.

Lotteries have been referred to as a "tax on stupidity" by social commentators as the odds of winning are astronomically low. Given the payoff structure, the maximum "revenue to risk ratio" occurs with the purchase of a single ticket; purchasing additional tickets does not proportionally increase the expected value of the total purchase.

Lottery in the United States

In the United States, the existence of lotteries is subject to the laws of each state; there is no national lottery. The first state lottery in the U.S. was established in the state of New Hampshire in 1964; since then, lotteries have sprung up in over half of the states in the U.S. On October 8, 1970, New York held the first million dollar lottery drawing.

The first modern interstate lottery in the U.S. was Tri-State Lotto. Tri-State Lotto was formed in 1985 and linked the states of Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont. In 1988, the Multi-State Lottery Association was formed with Oregon, Iowa, Kansas, Rhode Island, West Virginia and the District of Columbia as its charter members; it is best known for its "Powerball" drawing, which is designed to build up very large jackpots. Another interstate lottery, The Big Game (now called Mega Millions), was formed in 1996 by the states of Georgia, Illinois, Massachusetts, Maryland, Michigan and Virginia as its charter members.

Other interstate lotteries include: Hot Lotto, Lotto South, and Wild Card 2. For more detailed information on U.S. lotteries, see Lottery (U.S.)

See also: Keno

Lottery in France

The first known lottery in France was created by the King François 1er around 1505. After that first attempt, lotteries were forbiden during two centuries.

They reapered at the end of 17th century, as "public lottery" for the Paris municipality (called Loterie de L'Hotel de Ville) and as "private" ones for religious orders (mostly wemen covents).
Lotteries became quickly one of the most important ressources for religious congregations in the 18th century.
Lotteries helped to build or rebuild many churches (about 15 from including the biggest ones) in Paris during the 18th century, like "St Sulpice" or "le Panthéon".

At the beginning of the century, the King gave the right to do lotteries to religious orders avoiding by this action to give them money, but the amounts generated by lotteries became so important that the second part of the century turned into a struggle between the monarchy and the Church for lotteries control.
In 1774, the "Loterie de L'Ecole Militaire" was founded by the monarchy (By Mme de Pompadour exactly, to buy what is called today the "Champ de Mars" in Paris, and build a Military Academy, where, by the way, Napoleon was student) and all other lotteries were forbiden except 3 or 4 minor ones.
This lottery became a few years later the "Loterie Royale de France"... the unique lottery in France, the monarchy was victorious.
Just before the French Revolution (1789) the revenues from La Lotterie Royale de France was about 5 to 7% of total french state revenues.

All along the 18th century, Philosophers like Voltaire, but also some bishops faught lotteries as a real screw for the poors and this subject has generated a lot of debates, books, fights to define if lotteries were moral or not.

All lotteries (including state lotteries) were forbidden by idealists from the French Revolution (in 1791).
The Lottery reapered in France in 1936, called "loto", when socialists needed to increase State Revenues. Since that time, La Française des Jeux (belonging to the French State) has a monopol on most of the games in France, including lotteries.