Birmingham Slot Machines Not Sweepstakes

The government of Alabama is very specific on the terms and conditions under which a sweepstakes can be run, and why it is not like a slot machine. The Alabama Supreme Court ruled that the sweepstakes’ games that the Birmingham Race Course was running were slot machines and needed to be closed down. The track complied after an appeal of the slot machine ruling was denied.

Attorney General Kenneth Steely said that slot machines are illegal, and the machines that the track was using were definitely slot machines. Greenetrack is another one that came under suspicion, but they use bingo machines, which are entirely different from slot machines, and therefore are legal. They are playing a bingo card inside the machine, and the computer generates the numbers.

For it not to be a slot machine, the player cannot play against the machine itself. Steely said that the basic components of a slot machine are if there is payment of some kind, a prize of some sort, or chance instead of skill involved. He said they were touting the slot machines as sweepstakes machines, but if they had been then people would have been able to play the machines with no purchase necessary – which was not the case.

He also said that the sweepstakes machines would only be around for a limited time, and these slot machines had taken up permanent residence at the track. He said that the slot machines should not pay out many people as well, which these were doing. Finally, the machine should not be able to be converted into a slot machine, which these were able to do.

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