"Now that Maine's secretary of state has validated enough petition signatures, in November the state's voters will see their third high-stakes gambling referendum in four years.

This time, members of Maine's Passamaquoddy Indian tribe want to place slot machines and high-stakes beano alongside a commercial harness-racing track in Washington County.

While this newspaper has long opposed any type of high-stakes gambling in Maine ­ including the current casino operation in Bangor and the state lottery ­ it is hard not to sympathize with the sponsors of this petition

. Maine's Indian tribes have always been among the state's least-prosperous groups, despite the many promises to alleviate that poverty they have received from numerous state leaders. With very few exceptions, those promises have so far produced little in real economic benefits for the tribes.

Meanwhile, a law passed by the Legislature in 2005 to authorize gambling on Indian land in eastern Maine was vetoed by Gov. Baldacci, a staunch opponent of any gambling expansion.

It must be frustrating to see a voter-approved slot machine operation expanding in Bangor, where a new casino complex is nearing construction, while the tribes are denied the right to have the same sort of thing.

That doesn't mean, however, that this new casino question is worthy of support. In truth, it will suffer from the same problems and objections that other such efforts have yielded. "

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Editorial: Casino petition motives understandable (The Portland Press Herald 1/21)