The gambling ship Rex resists boarding by a California Fish & Game officers in Santa Monica Bay. From Los Angeles Daily News Collection at UCLA Library.
1928 saw the appearance of the first of the gambling ships off the Los Angeles County coastline. Although it was illegal to conduct a gambling operation in California, the state’s jurisdiction only extended up to three miles offshore. There was also nothing in Federal law that prohibited gambling, so operators of floating gambling casinos merely had to anchor just outside the three mile limit. These ships proved so profitable that, by 1930, a virtual small fleet of gambling ships lay anchored a few miles offshore from Long Beach and Santa Monica.
Local law enforcement and protectors of public morality saw this as an affront to state laws. Numerous attempts were made to shut down or frustrate the operations of these ships, but gambling ship operators managed to fight off most such attempts in court.
In 1930, Tony Cornero Stralla was released from prison, after serving time for Prohibition violations. He immediately saw the profit potential in gambling ships. After an unsuccessful partnership in one such ship, Cornero launched his own, the S.S. Rex, in 1938. The Rex foreshadowed the approach that Las Vegas would later adapt. Rather than high-rolling wealthy gamblers, it focused on the middle class. It offered clean, delightful places for gambling and entertainment, with free or subsidizing food, and transportation to and from the ship. Cornero deliberately and dramatically portrayed the Rex as free of the often rumored rigged games. He offered anyone an immediate $100,000 cash payout if they could find any game on his ship that was illegal or rigged.
Despite efforts to frustrate public interest in the new gambling ship, the Rex was a success from the beginning. It operated 24 hours per day, normally with 1,000 to 3,000 gamblers aboard at any one time.
A 1939 crowd at the Santa Monica Pier boards the ferry Irene for one of the gambling barges. Los Angeles Times Photograph Archive at the UCLA Library.
It did not take long for anti-gambling ship forces to take notice. Just months after the Rex opened, Los Angeles District Attorney Buron Fitts attempted to shut the ship down. Accompanied by Los Angeles County Sheriff Eugene Biscailuz and Santa Monica Police Chief Charles Dice (editor note: we kid you not) in tow, Fitts commandeered several water taxis that were servicing the Rex and sailed out to arrest Cornero. After a brief standoff, Cornero voluntarily submitted to arrest, so as to challenge the issue in court.
D.A. Fitts argued that Santa Monica Bay constituted an "inland" body of water and therefore, the Santa Monica coastline was not the true coastline for the State of California. He argued that, to determine the true state coastline, one had to draw an imaginary line between Point Vicente and Point Dume. Consequently, the Rex would have been required to anchor itself many more miles out to sea, a proposition that would have required an inconvenient and unattractive seafaring trip in order to visit the ship. Cornero, for his part, countered that Santa Monica Bay was not in fact a bay. It was a bight, a large coastal indentation. Cornero proclaimed that Santa Monica Bay was more accurately called Santa Monica Bight. The court sided with the District Attorney, but, the ruling was overturned upon appeal. Cornero returned to operating the Rex.
In 1939, State Attorney General Earl Warren proposed a new legal argument against offshore gambling ships. He called them "a great nuisance" and argued that they drew millions of dollars from legitimate purposes and would inevitably lead to floating narcotics dens and houses of prostitution. He reasoned that states had the power to abate a nuisance, even if it lay outside state jurisdiction.
After failing to comply with a state order to cease and desist, all but one of the gambling ships were seized by law enforcement. The Rex, for its part, gated off its landing platform and turned a fire hose on raiding police vessels. Thus began the siege of the Rex. Since the Rex had no engines of its own and could not sail off, Warren figured that the ship would eventually have choice but to surrender. After eight days, Cornero did surrender, explaining, "because I need a haircut." Law enforcement officers swarmed the ship, tossing all of its gambling equipment into the water.
Gambling ship operators continued to argue in court that their operations were legal and, consequently, law enforcement actions against their ships amounted to piracy. The courts, however, upheld Warren’s legal arguments. The California Supreme Court ultimately agreed that Santa Monica Bight should once again be known as Santa Monica Bay. Cornero for himself, however, managed to escape facing any charges.
The seized Rex ended up being put into war service in World War II. It was later captured by a German submarine and sunk off the coast of Africa.
