More than 300 people gathered Feb. 16 at Bethel Baptist Church, Moody, to stand against gambling in St. Clair County.
Alabama Baptist leaders organized the anti-gambling rally to fight recent attempts to legalize electronic bingo gambling in the county as well as to pray together about the issue, said James Sampley, pastor of First Baptist Church, Ashville.
With four television stations and at least three newspapers present, organizers believed the event was a success.
“It was a good meeting with good results,” said Ben Chandler, director of missions for St. Clair Baptist Association. “It was (also) enlightening to our people.”
Alabama Baptist ministers and key leaders have been fighting to keep gambling expansion efforts at bay since Ashville City Council members passed an ordinance in December allowing electronic bingo games at the American Legion hall.
Things heated up when Sheriff Terry Surles threatened to arrest anyone participating in electronic bingo, citing the county’s constitutional amendment that limits bingo to “card” games.
Soon afterward, Mayor Robert McKay and the city of Ashville filed a lawsuit against Surles seeking a declaratory judgment on the legality of electronic bingo gambling in the county. According to Surles, McKay — a paid financial officer of the American Legion hall — and other city leaders also want circuit Judge Chris Robinson to issue an injunction preventing him from making any bingo-related arrests until the matter is resolved in the state Supreme Court.
A hearing was originally set for Feb. 20 but was moved to March 6 to allow the sheriff’s office time to research the types of machines being sought for Ashville.
“My stand is that I have to follow the law,” said Surles, who received a standing ovation from the crowd at the rally. “I’m your sheriff until you elect a new one. … Maybe someone else will satisfy the other crowd, but I’ll stick with this crowd any day.”
He added, “It means a lot to me to know I’m not in this by myself.”
Sampley reassured Surles that the city of Ashville, not the people of Ashville, is against him.
“If we approve [electronic bingo gambling], check with us five years later to see how bad this [county] is,” Sampley told attendees. “Our county will be the loser if this comes in. We will open the floodgates. … We will never recover. If you get it in, you can’t get rid of it.”
Curry Harris, pastor of Cool Springs Baptist Church, Ashville, prayed for those opposing gambling to maintain an attitude of love and remember the golden rule. “We are against gambling because we love our neighbors,” he said. “We don’t want their families destroyed.
“Gambling is not the answer. … It will cause more economic woes.”
State Baptist leaders Joe Bob Mizzell, director of the Alabama Baptist State Board of Missions’ Christian ethics office, and Joe Godfrey, executive director of Alabama Citizens Action Program, spoke on the ills of gambling and urged St. Clair County citizens to fight any form of it in their area.
Mizzell told attendees that gambling brings poverty, crime, immorality and corruption to government.
“If I love my neighbor as myself, I’m not going to take from him or her without giving them something of equal value,” he said. “The gambling industry takes and doesn’t care about the individual or the principle of love, but I do and the people of Alabama do.”
Godfrey encouraged citizens to “stand firm against the gambling industry.”
“If gambling comes to your community, it’s going to affect every life in this community,” he said. “The gambling industry and those supporting gambling talk about how much they give to the community, but they don’t give one penny. It’s the losers who give all the money.”
The county’s delegation of legislators — three representatives and two senators — attended the rally.
Sen. Scott Beason, R-Gardendale, said he doesn’t care about the financial promises made by gambling proponents. He cares about the families who will be affected by gambling.
To fight it, Beason urged St. Clair County residents to get out from behind the eight ball, find out where their legislators stand on this matter and write letters to the ones supporting gambling.
“I’m opposed to gambling and that’s not going to change,” Beason said, stating that he and other delegates were looking into ways to fight gambling in the area through legislative efforts.
Rep. Blaine Galliher, R-Gadsden, said, “I think when the issue of bingo was brought up years ago, people envisioned a small pingpong ball bouncing around … a form of entertainment, not that someone would lose or win a fortune.
“I don’t think people envisioned what has happened today with the thousands of machines,” he said. “With the lottery vote in 1999, people can’t say they haven’t had the opportunity to vote on the concept of gambling. I think the people have spoken.
“The sheriff is exactly correct [to uphold] the law as it now stands. I applaud him for that.”
Rusty Tate, pastor of Springville First United Methodist Church, said he appreciates the Baptists for organizing the rally and “taking a stand.”
The rally helped bring attention to the problem and was a positive thing, Tate said. “Gambling is a vice. Gambling is wrong. Gambling is anti-scriptural. What gambling does is produce a lot of losers.”
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