Public Law 27–CCLXXXII

That from and after the first

Sale of lottery tickets in the District of Columbia, after 1st January 1843, unlawful.

day of January, one thousand eight hundred and forty-three, it shall not be lawful, to keep within the District of Columbia any office or place of business for the sale of lottery tickets, or of any share or interest in lottery tickets, nor shall it be lawful to sell or offer for sale within the said District, any lottery ticket or any share or interest in any lottery

Penalty for offending.

ticket; and every person who shall be duly convicted of offending against the provisions of this act shall be punished by imprisonment in the common jail of the county in which the offence shall have been committed for a period not less than one, nor more than six calendar months, and shall forfeit and pay a fine of not less than one hundred nor exceeding one thousand dollars, one half of which shall go to the informer, and the other half to the municipal corporation within whose corporate limits the offence shall have been committed; but if committed without the limits of any municipal corporation, then such moiety of the fine shall go to the United States.

Sec. 3.

And be it further enacted, That the contract of sale for such lottery ticket or tickets, or share or interest in such lottery ticket or tickets, shall be absolutely void, and the person or persons paying there for shall have a right to recover back the money paid therefor as money

Certain lottery tickets excepted for one year.

paid on a void consideration: Provided, That nothing herein contained shall be construed to restrain the selling of lottery tickets, so far as the same is authorized by any existing contract made by the Common Council of the city of Alexandria, under an ordinance of the Common Council of the said city, passed on the fifth day of December, eighteen Hundred and twenty-seven, and approved by the President of the United States, if such contract is made, and so far as the same is made, in conformity with the provisions of its charter, nor so far as the selling of the same is authorized by any subsisting license of any of the cities of the said District, for the period of one year from the passage of this act: And provided, further, That it shall not be lawful, under color of any TWENTY-SEVENTH CONGRESS. Sess. II. Ch. 283, 286. 1842.contract made with the Common Council of the said city of Alexandria, as aforesaid, to vend or sell tickets, or parts of tickets, or shares, in any lottery or lotteries, authorized by the Legislature of any State or Territory within the United States, or any foreign Government.