_Press Competitions and Coupon Gambling._—So numerous are the devices of the baser organs of the press, and even of some which find it difficult to hold out against their competition, that no reform of the law is likely to be effective without some enactment making the offering of prizes illegal beyond a certain small amount; which compromise can hardly be avoided, because the best of these newspaper competitions offer undoubtedly some educational inducements. Those which are merely gambling vehicles should be suppressed. The bad position here again rests upon the foolish old dictum as to a modicum of skill covering a quantity of gambling. For instance, an unfortunate decision of the High Court in _Hall_ v. _Cox_ (1 Q.B. 1899), held that guesses at the numbers of the next Registrar-General’s return (although any competitor could purchase any quantity of the newspaper, filling in a different number for each one, thus making it an extensive gamble at will) did not constitute a lottery, because a certain amount of skill could be exercised by the study of previous returns. This led to numerous imitations, one of which was guessing at the future circulation of a paper, which had the additional journalistic merit of acting as a good advertisement. Amongst many, one poor and foolish artisan acknowledged that he had purchased considerable numbers of the newspaper, and its great increase in circulation by the device shows how many credulous persons were willing to gamble under the shelter of the law. Two brief sections should meet the difficulties under this heading:— 1. Make all such competitions in which there is a material element of chance illegal. 2. Make it illegal for any publication to offer in any one edition a prize or prizes of the aggregate value of more than £5 for any purpose whatever.