Louisiana State Lottery Company

The Louisiana State Lottery Company was a private corporation that in the mid-19th century ran the Louisiana lottery. It was for a time the only legal lottery in the United States, and for much of that time had a very foul reputation as a swindle of the state and citizens and a repository of corruption.

The company, initially a syndicate from New York, was chartered on August 11, 1868 by the Louisiana General Assembly with a 25-year charter and in exchange gave the State $40,000 a year. With the passage of the charter, all other organized gambling was made illegal. This start almost immediately gave it a bad reputation as having bribed the legislators into a corrupt deal, especially at a time when other states were viewing lotteries and gambling with suspicion. It was founded by John A. Morris and Charles T. Howard, the former owning a controlling interest and the latter serving as its nominal head.

Charles Howard served as the first president, having previously worked for the Alabama Lottery and Kentucky State Lottery. Former Confederate Generals P.G.T. Beauregard and Jubal Anderson Early held the drawings. They added credibility but according to the New York Times they were paid handsomely for the few days each month their services were needed. Most of the tickets were sent via special train (there was so much mail it required a special consideration) to agents in the U.S. and abroad who would sell them in their respective areas.

In 1890, three years before the charter's expiration, the company bribed the legislature into passing an act to write them into the constitution (thus requiring a successful supermajority of both houses of the Louisiana State Legislature and referendum) by offering to give the state $500,000 per year.

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