The stage has been set.  Today, the Interactive Media Entertainment and Gaming Association will finally get a solid crack at the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act.  This is the first time the constitutionality of the law will sincerely be challenged.  Back in 2007, Representative Barney Frank attempted to introduce a bill that would have the 2006 law that targeted online casinos overturned.  That bill never left the House of Representatives.

Now events have been set in motion and if the attorneys representing the Interactive Media Entertainment and Gaming Association can persuade the panel of three judges in the United States 3^rd Circuit Court of Appeals that the law in unconstitutional, online casinos will be one major step closer to regulation and legalization.

The three judge panel will be hearing from both the Interactive Media Entertainment and Gaming Association and the Department of Justice.  Representing iMEGA is the team of Eric Bernstein and Stephen A Saltzburg.  Berstein was the first to argue that the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act should be overturned in the US District Court.  His partner, Saltzburg, is a professor at the George Washington University school of law.  Saltzburg also served time as the deputy attorney-general of the United States.

As disagreeable as the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act might be, getting a law stricken from the books is no small feat.  Overturning the law itself will not make online casinos legal in the United States, an additional bill will need to be passed to make that happen, but it does lift prohibitions on financial institutions to block all transactions from online casinos.