Doyle's opinion on Indian gaming has shifted

As attorney general, he backed ban on casinos

By AMY RINARD AND STEVEN WALTERS arinard@journalsentinel.com

Friday, February 21, 2003

Eleven years ago, then-Attorney General Jim Doyle urged the state to enact a constitutional amendment banning casino gambling, saying it would bolster his federal court battle to end casino gambling on Indian lands.

This week, Doyle, now governor, reached a deal with the Oneida Indian tribe that would permit the largest expansion of gambling operations at Indian casinos since the signing of the first compacts. The tentative agreement would let the tribe's casinos stay open 24 hours and operate games that are now illegal, and it would have no ending date.

Since the earliest days of casino gambling in Wisconsin, Doyle has been at the forefront of the issue, often tangling -- but sometimes agreeing -- with former Gov. Tommy G. Thompson and the Legislature as the state came to grips with a 1991 federal court ruling that cleared the way for Indian casinos.

Doyle, elected attorney general in November 1990, had a particular disdain for the lottery, which he once blasted in an interview as "government raising money by making people think they might get rich."

He liked the lottery even less later that year when a federal judge ruled that because Wisconsin voters had approved a state lottery in 1987, Indian tribes had the right to conduct all forms of casino gambling on tribal lands.

In June 1991, only days after that ruling, Doyle said in an interview that short of repealing the constitutional amendment that legalized the lottery, there was nothing for the state to do but negotiate with the tribes to avoid wide-open gambling on reservations.

But a year later, Doyle urged the Legislature to pass a bill proposed by Thompson that would have prohibited casino gambling in the state. And later in 1992, Doyle endorsed another proposal to ban all Indian gaming in the state by enacting a constitutional amendment prohibiting casino gambling.

"At one time, Governor Doyle was considered a gambling opponent, but he apparently changed his mind during the campaign last year," noted state Rep. Steve Nass (R-Palmyra.)

During his campaign and as recently as this week, Doyle said as long as there is casino gambling in Wisconsin, it makes little sense to argue over what kinds of games may be played at the casinos.

On Thursday, Doyle said his compacts reflect the reality that casinos were legalized more than 12 years ago, are popular and "here to stay."

"Let's face it, under federal law, the Indian casinos are going to stay in this state -- no matter what the state does," he said. "They are going to be large operations, and the only issue here is whether the state is going to get a significant share of that money, or isn't it.

"I think we're doing a pretty good job to make sure the state gets a good share," he added.

As attorney general, Doyle was often at odds with Thompson over the handling of compact negotiations.

In November 2000, for example, Doyle blasted Thompson for secretly negotiating a deal with the Menominee Indians for a casino in Kenosha that would have ultimately allowed games such as craps and roulette.

"By changing the contract in secret, the governor has set the stage to allow poker, roulette, craps, baccarat, dog-track betting and has opened the door to raise the stakes on the level of bets that can be made," Doyle said at the time.

And as recently as two years ago, he said the Legislature -- not the governor -- should negotiate gaming compacts.

In an interview with the political Web site WisPolitics.com in August 2000, Doyle said he was surprised the Legislature never took back the contract-negotiating authority, which it had given to Thompson.

"I'd like to see the Legislature take that power back," he said then. "They conceded it to the governor back in the '80s -- this power to negotiate. And I believe Wisconsin's the only state in the country where that's happened. And it's really kind of amazing to me that the Legislature has never taken it back."

That's what GOP lawmakers attempted to do Thursday, when they called an emergency session to pass a bill giving the Legislature the authority to approve gaming compacts.

While Doyle may have liked the idea in 2000, on Thursday he said he had changed his mind:

"Now that I'm governor, maybe I see this a little more clearly," he said. "To have 132 legislators and the governor out there negotiating compacts -- with all the complexities of them -- I just think would be impossible."

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