18 U.S.C. § 1302
Section 1302 · Mailing lottery tickets or related matter
Amended 4 times on record
Applied in 33 court decisions — leading case United States v. Smaldone (1973)
Most recently applied in Mitchell v. United States (June 2015)
How often courts cite this section
Court decisions citing this, by year.Markers show enactment, consequential amendments, and circuit splits over this section — watch for a citation surge after a change or a disagreement. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.
Whoever knowingly deposits in the mail, or sends or delivers by mail:
Any letter, package, postal card, or circular concerning any lottery, gift enterprise, or similar scheme offering prizes dependent in whole or in part upon lot or chance;
Any lottery ticket or part thereof, or paper, certificate, or instrument purporting to be or to represent a ticket, chance, share, or interest in or dependent upon the event of a lottery, gift enterprise, or similar scheme offering prizes dependent in whole or in part upon lot or chance;
Any check, draft, bill, money, postal note, or money order, for the purchase of any ticket or part thereof, or of any share or chance in any such lottery, gift enterprise, or scheme;
Any newspaper, circular, pamphlet, or publication of any kind containing any advertisement of any lottery, gift enterprise, or scheme of any kind offering prizes dependent in whole or in part upon lot or chance, or containing any list of the prizes drawn or awarded by means of any such lottery, gift enterprise, or scheme, whether said list contains any part or all of such prizes;
Any article described in section 1953 of this title—
Shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than two years, or both; and for any subsequent offense shall be imprisoned not more than five years.
Editorial notes U.S. Code · Office of the Law Revision Counsel
Historical and Revision Notes
Based on title 18, U.S.C., 1940 ed., §336 (Mar. 4, 1909, ch. 321, §213, 35 Stat. 1129).
Reference to persons causing or procuring was omitted as unnecessary in view of definition of “principal” in section 2 of this title.
Venue provision was omitted as covered by sections 3231 and 3237 of this title.
Minor changes were made in arrangement and phraseology.
Amendments
1994—Pub. L. 103–322 substituted “fined under this title” for “fined not more than $1,000” in last par.
1961—Pub. L. 87–218 inserted sixth par., relating to articles described in section 1953 of this title.
1951—Act Oct. 31, 1951, substituted a colon for a semicolon at end of opening clause.
Cross References
Exclusion of lottery matter from mails, see section 3005 of Title 39, Postal Service.
Postal service, offenses affecting, see section 1691 et seq. of this title.