Gaming Group to Challenge Federal Sports Gambling Prohibition
Reports over the weekend have revealed plans by the Interactive Media Entertainment and Gaming Association to file a lawsuit challenging the legitimacy of the Professional and Amateur Sports Act. The organization says the federal law against sports gambling is unconstitutional.The law has come under recent attack as New Jersey legislators are eager to explore the possibility of legalizing sports wagering. Delaware has already begun a process to restore its dormant sports wagering system. But New Jersey is one of forty-six states bound by the federal act to abide by the ban, while Delaware is grandfathered in allowing it to do as it chooses.
PokerNews Daily reports that the brief by iMEGA will contest the validity of the law on the grounds that it violates the First, Tenth, and Eleventh Amendments, the Commerce Clause, the Equal Protection Clause, and the right to due process. The gambling representatives also contend the law should be struck as void for vagueness, a major component of iMEGA's suit against the UIGEA.
The crux of the case lies within the Tenth Amendment, which limits federal powers to those specifically prescribed to it by the Constitution. All other powers and legal authorities is granted to the individual states, to determine for themselves.
IMEGA Chairman Joe Brennan, Jr., told PND that the Sports Protection Act was opposed by both the Attorney General and the Department of Justice when it was passed, but that the statute was never taken to court for judicial review.
