As Maine prepares to reintroduce slot-machine gambling – up to 1,500 of the one-armed bandits at the Bangor Harness Raceway – legislators should recall the public revulsion that ended an earlier experience with the slots back in 1980.

A so-called nickel-and-dime gambling law was passed in the mid-’70s to benefit Cub Scouts, churches, service clubs and other charities. An Associated Press story in 1979 reported that the law “has opened the door to a multimillion-dollar operation with salesmen for Nevada companies pushing slot machines in bars, hotels and bowling alleys.” More than 700 “nonprofit organizations” were licensed to run the slots, wheels of fortune, poker games, beano and craps.

Salesmen for the machine distributors were actively recruiting “charities,” which often were founded overnight and applied for gambling licenses the next day. Gambling in Maine mushroomed into a $17 million-a-year business. State Sen. Richard H. Pierce, who wanted the slots restricted, said slot-machine distributors from as far away as Nevada took $4.2 million out of the state.

State Police Sgt. Gregory Spitzer, who supervised the Public Safety Department’s Games of Chance Division at the time, found it impossible to monitor the machines to determine the fairness of payout, whether the charities were actually benefiting as required, or even how much money was paid into the machines. The problem was that they were owned by out-of-state distributors who controlled access to the machines. But such a backlash developed that Gov. Joseph E. Brennan ordered the slots closed down and backed legislation to make the ban permanent. The voters finally confirmed the ban by a 2-to-1 margin in a 1980 referendum demanded by members of Associated Non-Profit Organizations.

Last November, when Maine voters rejected a casino bill but approved slot machines for harness racetracks, Gov. John Baldacci wisely ordered a redraft of the slot-machine bill that had been written by gambling interests. His representatives explained at as recent meeting of the Committee of 50 that the amended bill, LD 1820, provided protection against any of those earlier abuses.

The bill, expected to be debated soon in the Maine House of Representatives, is, indeed an improvement on the original version. But critics including Sgt. Spitzer, now retired and living in Boothbay, still see flaws. They contend that the machines cannot be monitored effectively as long as they are owned and controlled by the distributors. They argue that the machines should be owned by the operators – in this case the Bangor Raceway – and monitored at the site by skilled state employees, rather than at a distance by contract employees under a system of “central-site” monitoring.

Reason for caution comes in a recent Associated Press dispatch from Baton Rouge. Louisiana State Police arrested six employees of Casino Rouge of skimming at least $50,000 in a year-long slot machine scam. The employees are accused of manipulating a system in which supervisors sometimes verify slot machine winnings. Instead of verifying winnings, the accused people are said to have generated slips that they cashed themselves.

Twelve casino employees have now been charged and await prosecution. The casino is owned by Penn National Gaming, Inc., which holds a conditional racing license for the racetrack casino in Bangor. The Louisiana case doubtless will be considered as the Maine Harness Racing commission or the proposed Gambling Commission as it judges Penn National’s “suitability” as a licensee.

Gambling has a way of stimulating waves of enthusiasm and waves of backlash. Although horse-racing interests and other prospective beneficiaries of the Bangor slots are eager for a startup at the Bangor Raceway, this is a time for care and deliberation, so that Maine won’t stumble into another era of abuse.