User:Patrick Mish/sandbox

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gambling_ship

Patrick Mish 3/22/15 LIBEn 100-2 Gambling ship

Legality:
Some cities and city officials do not agree if gambling ships should be allowed to go out to sea and gamble but then come back and dock in ports where gambling is illegal. The gambling ships have to travel for over forty five minutes to reach international waters before they could gamble legally. In the city of New York, where gambling had been deemed illegal, there are some companies that would send their gambling ships to go out to sea into international waters which is about forty five minutes out so people could gamble on their ships legally. There was a State Assembly Speaker, Sheldon Silver, who was completely against gambling ships. He argued that even if they gambled forty five minutes out at sea it was still illegal to come back in to a New York City port with gambling paraphernalia. Other speakers said that the gambling ships would be great for the city because they would bring in tax revenues and tourism that would help the cities economy. There were other cities around New York City that allowed gambling and if New York did not let gambling ships be legal, those other cities may take all of the potential profit. Ultimately it was up to the mayor to decide if the gambling ships would be allowed or not.

Enforcement of the Law
There was once an incident off of the shore of California by Santa Monica Bay. A man, Tony Cornero, owned a ship called “Rex.” Cornero licensed his ship from the state of Nevada, where gambling was legal, and set anchor three miles out from the coast of California. There were water taxis that would carry boat loads of people out to the “Rex” and they could gamble on the ship. A State Attorney General, Earl Warren, did not like having this ship off the coast of his state. Warren set out with the sheriff department and drove boats out to the “Rex” to shut it down. Cornero would not give in for eight days. But, when he did the dispute went to the courts. California’s supreme court decided that “three mile line” that marked international waters was not actually only three miles out from the nearest shore. The “Rex” was shut down permanently.

Gambling ships in Hawaii:
Hawaii is one of three states that does not legalize any types of wagering such as gambling. So for a gambling ship to be sent from a Hawaiian island would be a very hard accomplishment. Hawaii has some strict laws on what types and which country flagged ships can dock in its ports. These ships that have gambling on them are cruise ships. Even though Hawaii has strict rules on its ports, a foreign flagged cruise ship can still dock in a Hawaiian port if it also docks in a foreign port somewhere along the cruise. During these cruises there would be gambling on the ship once it got to international waters. A cruise ships would not be allowed to have any type of gambling aboard its ship if its initial or final destination was to a port on one of the Hawaiian Islands even when those ships are in international waters.

Gambling Ships a Bust:
Even though there is a lot of money to be made in the business of gambling ships, not all of them work out the way they were supposed to. Manhattan Cruises based out of Manhattan ran in to a problem of not enough people showing up on their overnight cruises. So the company was not making enough money to break even. The company is now trying to make multiple departures from the port throughout one day. The company thinks that it will be easier for passengers because they do not have to stay on all day and this could help the company make more money. It was hard for the company to make money because the mayor put high fees for the gambling ships to use the city’s piers. With bigger companies comes bigger ships which makes it that much harder on the smaller companies who are trying to get in the gambling ship industry. Smaller companies are sometimes faced with the choice of merging with bigger companies or going out of business. There are different factors that make it hard for the smaller companies to compete with the larger companies such as Carnival Corps and Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd. One of the factors is that the bigger companies can afford to make newer and bigger ships. Newer ships can hold up to 4,400 passengers and crew. These smaller ships can not carry those large of numbers. Newer ships acquire more updated safety requirements from the IMO, [[International Maritime Organization|International Maritime Organization The smaller companies have older ships that are not equipped with the new safety standards and will have to get these requirements if it can afford them. An analyst at Oppenheimer & Co. ,Steven Eisenberg, says this type of industry will be ruled by two to three big companies who will rule the sea in gambling ships.

Peer Edit Notes by McLuckie
yo keep it simple don't use run on sentences. stop using the word that it drives me crazy. also watch your tense a lot of times i saw you were using past tense then present. just avoid using too many pronouns all together. Interseting topic although maybe add a section about how gambling ships are used today because you talked a lot about the past but not the present. sources look good.