When I was a child, our family’s annual vacation often entailed
a week in Tahoe. We girls would spend the day at the lake:
swimming, sandcastling, and occasionally kayaking, as our parents
sunbathed nearby.
When I was a child, our family’s annual vacation often entailed a week in Tahoe. We girls would spend the day at the lake: swimming, sandcastling, and occasionally kayaking, as our parents sunbathed nearby.
At night, our parents would go out to the clubs, locking the motel door behind them with stern warnings not to let any strangers in. We would watch TV and fall asleep, and when we woke in the mornings, our parents would be back, sleeping, and allow themselves to be wakened to take us, groggily, to breakfast and to the beach.
My parents never gambled away the mortgage or grocery money. They never fought about gambling. They never became depressed or guilty about it.
They just went out, had a cheap, good dinner at a casino, and played till the wee hours, drinking the so-called free drinks. My dad would win a little at blackjack or craps, and my mom would lose a little on keno or slots. Their evening out would end up costing them about what dinner-and-a-movie costs my husband and me.
The foregoing may help to explain why I cannot agree with my fellow conservatives that a casino must be opposed. True, some people are compulsive gamblers. True, some casinos may encourage criminal behavior. True, some casino owners may attempt to corrupt the political process.
But from a constitutionalist point of view, we cannot make the argument that people are not to be trusted, therefore we will protect them from themselves for their own good. That is the argument people use to ban guns; it is the argument people used to prohibit alcohol; it is the straight road to tyranny, paved with the customary good intentions.
The early Republic did not prohibit gambling, or drinking, for that matter. In fact, large parts of the Revolution were planned in the Green Dragon Inn, over a friendly mug of ale, with, likely, a poker game going on downstairs.
So from a constitutionalist perspective, I have to say that whatever legal activity a property owner wants to conduct on his property is his business.
On the other hand, I personally dislike casinos. They are large, glitzy, noisy, and smoky. I am too much of a tightwad to enjoy risking money. If a casino is built on Highway 25, I will not be darkening its doors.
On the third hand, I also dislike television, recreational vehicles, Metallica, and big houses on small lots. But this is a free country, and other people may enjoy them, as long as I get to go backpacking.
On the fourth hand – I am beginning to feel like Shiva, here – the casino is being proposed by some Miwoks. Despite what their lawyer is saying, Miwoks are not native to the Gilroy or Hollister area.
I learned this back when my eldest child was nine, and we studied California history. That September, I read aloud to the kids most of “The Ohlone Way.” We also made acorn mush and spear throwers and tule boats, and gambled with walnut shells. It was a fun month.
The Miwoks’ hereditary lands were located in the Central Valley. The lands were quite extensive, stretching from Concord almost to Placerville, and reaching down to Yosemite. Their lawyer is exaggerating when he says they lived here.
Our local original inhabitants were what the Spanish called Ohlone. There were not actually any Ohlone, however. The term Ohlone referred to the large number of very small tribes, speaking similar languages and with similar customs, who lived in the game-rich, wet environs of San Francisco Bay.
The tribes closest to Hollister and Gilroy seem to have been the Unijaima, the Pitac, and the Chitactac. The interested reader may peruse maps of California and Ohlone tribal lands on www.nativecc.com. I would love to know what the link is between these tribes and the Amah-Mutsun. Is Amah-Mutsun the common language?
In sum, moral grounds are not sufficient to oppose an Indian casino. Nor are fears of increased crime or traffic. Nor are aesthetics.
But if we are going to have an Indian casino here, let it be for the benefit of our local tribes, not some carpetbagging Miwoks from Stockton.
