(Source of image: Florida State Archives)

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If you can't stop it, at least control it:  This is the attitude that Spanish authorities often took toward gambling during the 1500s.  Games of chance proved quite popular on the galleons that plied between Spain and the Americas.  Royal constables on the ships policed the dice & card games.  They issued a new deck of cards at the beginning of each contest in order to prevent marked cards from popping up.  They also collected a tip from each game's winner.  These funds paid for the cards, and the tips also spared the losers from the indignity of paying for their instruments of destruction.