Cite as: 509 U. S. 418 (1993)
Stevens, J., dissenting
Thirty-four States and the District of Columbia now sponsor a lottery.7 Three more States will initiate lotteries this year.8 Of the remaining 13 States, at least 5 States have recently considered or are currently considering establishing a lottery.9 In fact, even the State of North Carolina, whose antilottery policies the Federal Government's advertising ban are purportedly buttressing in this case, is considering establishing a lottery. See 1993 N. C. S. Bill No. 11, 140th Gen. Assembly. According to one estimate, by the end of this decade all but two States (Utah and Nevada) will have state-run lotteries.10
The fact that the vast majority of the States currently sponsor a lottery, and that soon virtually all of them will do so, does not, of course, preclude an outlier State from following a different course and attempting to discourage its citizens from partaking of such activities. But just as the fact that "the vast majority of the 50 States . . . prohibit[ed] casino gambling" purported to inform the Court's conclusion in Posadas de Puerto Rico Associates v. Tourism Co. of P. R., 478 U. S., at 341, that Puerto Rico had a "substantial" interest in discouraging such gambling, the national trend in the opposite direction in this case surely undermines the United States' contention that nonlottery States have a "substantial" interest in discouraging their citizens from traveling across state lines and participating in a neighboring State's lottery. The Federal Government and the States simply do not have an overriding or "substantial" interest in
7 Selinger, Special Report: Marketing State Lotteries, City and State 14 (May 24, 1993).
8 Ibid.
9 See, e. g., 1993 Ala. H. Bill No. 75, 165th Legislature—Regular Sess.; 1993 Miss. S. Concurrent Res. No. 566, 162d Legislature—Regular Sess.; 1993 N. M. S. Bill No. 141, 41st Legislature—First Regular Sess.; 1993 N. C. S. Bill No. 11, 140th Gen. Assembly; 1993 Okla. H. Bill No. 1348, 44th Legislature—First Regular Sess.
10 Selinger, supra.
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