On March 19, 1931, Nevadans did not know that the legalization of gambling with the stroke of a pen by Governor Fred Balzar would mean more to the vitality and growth of the state than any piece of legislation since the creation of the state. Although the game has been around for much longer and was introduced to the Silver State by prospectors looking for their mining assets, legal gambling officially began in 1931. Originally, gambling in Las Vegas was small. Mostly limited to downtown clubs and a few small rest stops on Boulder Highway and Highway 91, the thoroughfare that leads south of Los Angeles. But that changed when California hotelier Thomas Hull opened the doors to El Rancho Vegas, the first standalone casino complex on what would become the Las Vegas Strip over the next decade. But in 1931, as the country entered the Great Depression, new Representative Phil Tobin introduced a bill legalizing gambling on a large scale. On March 19 of that year, Governor Fred Balzer signed the bill. “I don`t know how visionary they were at the time,” Green said. “Success has a thousand fathers, failures and orphans, so of course everyone was a visionary. But it really worked. The way you see it at that time, the population of Las Vegas, when gambling became legal, was just over 5,000.

There are probably that many people in the spaghetti bowl right now. In Reno, the Silver Legacy Hotel & Casino opened on Virginia Street in 1995. However, with the passage of California`s Proposition 5 in 1998, Indian reservation casino games had an open door to compete with northern Nevada casinos. When Nevada entered the 21st century. Almost every state had gambling in one form or another, and improved access to Native American casino games drastically changed the way Nevada approached its tourism economy. In October 2015, the Commission issued a notice stating its position that daily paid fantasy sports (DFS) meet the definition of gambling under Nevada law and that, therefore, any person offering SFNs in Nevada must hold a license issued by the Commission to operate a sports pool. The council defined DFS as a game, but did not take a position on traditional seasonal fantasy sports. There may be regulatory consequences for companies that have operated illegally in the past and then apply for a license in Nevada. A few years ago, the board and commission hinted at their likely approach if companies that have operated offshore gambling businesses in the U.S.

get licenses before them. In 2011, Nevada gaming authorities dealt with Caesars Entertainment`s application to approve its affiliation with 888 Holdings, a company that offered online poker in the United States prior to 2006. When the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act (UIGEA) was enacted in 2006, 888 Holdings ceased operations in the United States. By finally approving Caesars` business relationship with 888 Holdings, the Board of Directors and the Commission signalled their general willingness to allow companies that ceased operations in 2006 as a result of UIGEA`s transition to operate in Nevada if they applied for a licence. “If you look at 1931, when gambling was legalized, it was a very small business at the time,” said David Schwartz, associate vice-president for faculty affairs at UNLV and associate professor in the university`s history department, who has written extensively on gambling history, gambling statistics and casino technology. “In the `50s, it grew tremendously and the regulatory structure had to grow with it.” When it was first proposed, its main sponsor said years later, it was mainly seen as a way to prevent the flow of money from illegal betting from leaving the state. In 1861, the territorial legislature introduced severe penalties for running and gambling. However, the measure did not have much success, and when Nevada became a state in 1864, the first legislature tried to legalize and regulate gambling instead, but failed. As a compromise, penalties for gambling have been drastically reduced, with operators being lenient and players not being punished at all. Located in the Great Basin Desert, few settlers chose to live in Nevada after the United States acquired the area at the end of the Mexican War in 1848. In 1859, the discovery of the gold and silver “Comstock Lode” prompted the first significant number of settlers in Nevada to take advantage of the territory`s mining opportunities.

Five years later, during the Civil War, Nevada hastily became the 36th state to strengthen the Union. In 1869, the Nevada state legislature finally succeeded in decriminalizing some forms of gambling, and Nevada`s gambling laws saw little change until 1909, when the Progressive Movement finally succeeded in passing laws banning nearly all gambling in the Silver State. Over the next few years, gambling laws were relaxed, initially allowing some social games and “nickel-in-the-slot machines” that paid for drinks, cigars, and sums under $2. In 1919, every city and county in the state licensed card rooms that allowed social games like bridge and whist, and by the 1920s, Reno became the gaming capital of the state, with legal card rooms and clubs offering illegal gambling. According to a history of the gambling industry on the Nevada Resort Association website, gambling was part of Nevada`s culture even before it became a state. Gold seekers looking for gold in the Sierra Nevada brought their gambling with them if they wanted to get rich. In 1967, the Nevada State Legislature decided to allow public companies to own and operate unlicensed gambling establishments to each shareholder, paving the way for the casino industry to become what it is today. In the 1960s, a new city was also founded on the Arizona-Nevada border. Don Laughlin, former owner of the 101 Club in Las Vegas, flew his private plane over the border triangle in 1964 and liked what he saw. In 1965, he bought a barricaded motel and 6.5 acres of riverside land for $250,000.

Within two years, the bar-motel, now called Riverside Resort, offered all-you-can-eat chicken dinners for 98 cents, games at 12 slot machines and two live gaming tables, and accommodations in four of the motel`s eight rooms (the Laughlin family occupied the other four rooms). It is not known how many casinos were open 90 years ago. The Railroad Pass Casino between Henderson and Boulder City was the state`s fourth licensee and opened on August 1, 1931 to entertain construction workers at Hoover Dam. Gambling was part of Nevada culture even before the state was founded. Many prospectors traveled to the area to search for gold in the Sierra Nevada, bringing their gambling with them. However, in the early 1860s, President Lincoln appointed Nevada Territory Governor James Nye, who took a vigilant stance against gambling and encouraged the territorial legislature to ban gambling. This huge advantage in the industry is why Nevada is still considered the leading authority in the country — and perhaps the world — when it comes to gambling. Foreign regulators often choose the heads of the state`s top legal officials to seek advice.