Federal Involvement in U.S. Gaming Regulation

Abstract

The federal government has a relatively long history of regulating gambling, but gambling has not been a very intense or consistent concern. For the most part, states have been left to their own resources in gambling regulation, and the federal government was interested in controlling gambling only to the extent that organized crime was a factor. The expansion of legal gambling to almost every state, the growth of Indian gaming, the need to generate new sources of revenue, the alarming potential of Internet gambling, and the growing impact of the gambling industry on the national economy have stimulated renewed interest on the part of the federal government in the regulation, not necessarily the prohibition, of gambling. The recent establishment of the National Gambling Impact Study Commission is indicative of this concern.