Far be it for me to write in support of casino gambling for I am not a gambler, save for a friendly game of nickel-and-dime poker with a three-limit raise. Hellsbells, I seldom even play the state lotto because the odds are so fantastically wild.

But, it bothers me as a new, full-time resident of Maine to listen to the now-forming opposition to, one, the proposed Indian casino for the Kittery area and two, gambling per se. And I say, “now-forming” opposition because you haven’t seen anything yet compared to what the opposition will bring to bear on this issue once the Indians make their formal proposal for the casino.

May I say, somewhat humbly, I know whereof I speak. Let’s turn the clock back to the early 1960’s. I was then a reporter for the Manchester Union Leader and the issue at hand was the New Hampshire Sweepstakes. At the time there was no other state-run lottery, which is what the New Hampshire Sweepstakes was. Prior to the New Hampshire Sweepstakes the only state operated lottery had been run in Louisiana around the turn of the century and it died largely because of corruption.

So, when New Hampshire began to seriously argue for the sweepstakes, the forces of opposition coalesced into a massive turnout of every conceivable church group, led by pastor or reverend, augmented by many state and local politicians who sought to curry favor with the same anti-gambling forces in the community; and then further augmented by many, if not most, of the academics from near and far. Moreover, this opposition was not limited to New Hampshire and New England. Indeed, the heavyweights in Washington’s Justice Department weighed in with no less the shrill voice of U.S. Attorney General Bobby Kennedy freely predicting that New Hampshire was destined to become a den of thieves and blackguards, crooks and murderers if the state enacted the sweepstakes. Oh I am here to tell you the fire and brimstone was intense.

But, the lawmakers of New Hampshire enacted the sweepstakes in spite of the opposition – prompted in part by New Hampshire’s disdain for being told what to do by outsiders. And the rest of the story is history. For none of the dire warning came to pass. In the early years of the New Hampshire Sweepstakes there was no crookery, no thievery, no gangland murders or scandal or corruption of any sort. Nor has there been a scintilla of corruption in the 38 years of the sweepstakes to this day.

And it is worth noting that countless other states have since thumbed their collective noses at the anti-gambling moralists and enacted their own state lotteries.

So now comes the Indians’ casino and we are beginning to hear the same wails from the opposition. It will corrupt our morals, they say. Hogwash. If the people want to gamble they will find a way. It will bring crooks and gangland druggies. That’s a lot of money honey, too. We don’t want the traffic and congestion, they’ll cry. That is the usual hue and cry from the not-in-my-backyard crowd.

What does the casino offer on the positive side? Well, for starters, jobs and these are not insignificant in these days. And to be candid, if not premature, one does not have to be a soothsayer to reasonable fear that sooner or later the Portsmouth Navy Yard may be shut down. And then, what to do with the thousands of people who will be jobless. To be sure, the casino will not offer similar wages, but even a casino jobs beats unemployment or welfare in these troubled times.

There will be extra revenue to the state when millions more are needed for countless state programs. And, interestingly enough, it is usually those more affluent citizens who are most vocal in opposition. In short, they don’t need the economic boost that a casino will bring. The tenured professors in their ivy-covered halls cry gloom and doom and the immorality of gambling. But, then, their wallets are not taxed or troubled by higher taxes for needed governmental goods and services.

There are still other factors to be considered, majorly that if Maine disdains a casino in Kittery, it is very likely that New Hampshire will not. And how sad it would be to see a large Indian casino just across the state line in New Hampshire, drawing patronage from Maine as well as jobs. And as an old New Hampshire man, I can easily see the Granite State willingly embrace such a proposal if that comes to pass.

Let me repeat, I am not a gambler who would frequent such a casino. I am a pragmatist, a realist. If people want to gamble, they’ll find a way and all of the do-gooders in the world are interviewing a Catholic bishop in New Hampshire on the mater of the morality of gambling. “Ah,” he said with a pixy glint in his eye and a touch of the Irish on his tongue, “and what better dollars to have. They’ve been in the hands of the devil too long.”

You may throw out the Indians’ casino – but the state of Maine and all of us Maine citizens will be the losers. These are very much the same arguments we heard in New Hampshire nearly 40 years ago.

John Jay Hanlon is a resident of Brewer.