Mar9

pay to play.

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there was a lottery that gave you immunity from being arrested

Get-out-of-jail-free cards aren’t exclusive to Monopoly.

When Queen Elizabeth I found herself in need of funds to pay off the debts incurred by her father Henry VIII’s reign, she began organizing England’s first national lottery in 1567. One of the prizes was arguably worth more than money: immunity from being arrested.

Elizabeth had been reluctant to raise taxes on her subjects despite her plans of expanding England’s naval forces and overseas expeditions, so she turned to a lottery instead. She wrote in a letter to Sir John Spencer in 1567, “It is expedient to have somme persons appointed of good trust to receave suche particular sommes as our subjects shall of their owne free disposition be ready to deliver upon the said lotterie.”

For the price of 10 shillings (about 120 pounds today, high enough to be cost-prohibitive for many citizens in Elizabethan England), entrants were eligible for a top prize of 5,000 pounds (around 1.1 million pounds today). The top 11 winners received cash prizes, and anyone who entered received temporary immunity from arrest for all crimes other than felonies, piracy, and treason — though this protection was not always enforced. The winners of that first lottery have alas been lost to history, but one imagines they enjoyed their low-stakes crime spree as much as, if not more than, their cash prize.

 

 

 

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source credits:history facts.com, parker brothers, monopoly

 

 

 

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49 responses »

  12. Whenever someone says we’ve never seen times like this before I know they haven’t looked critically at history. Nothing new under the sun, including the bs this regime is pulling.

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  16. Oh I love this. Of course, I’m the same person who carries around a Monopoly “Get out of Jail” free card in my wallet. If I’m ever stopped for speeding, I want to hand it to the police officer to see if it will work. At least to see if the officer has a sense of humor. Knowing my luck . . . he or she will throw the book at me. Ha, ha.

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