It's also illegal in the US to jail someone for debts. The way they get around this in Nevada is to jail you for writing bad checks, which is fraud. THat is to say: intentionally writing a check you know will bounce is fraud and a crime, but in the event that a check you wrote bounces, it's hard to prove that you didn't know the check would bounce when you wrote it. So it's not really debtor's prison, but almost a loophole to create a debtor's prison.
In short, checks are more like cash than IOUs. If I give you $100 cash and it turns out to be magic disintegrating paper, we don't revert back to the "I owe you $100" state.
Here are some examples where it wouldn't mean bad faith, and I'm pretty sure the majority of the time a bad check would NOT indicate bad faith:
I wrote a check, but I was changing direct deposit accounts at my employer to a new account. I transposed my account number, my paycheck didn't get deposited, my check bounced. Oops!
I completely forgot that I wrote a check earlier in the week. I write the second check after looking at my bank account balance which says I should be able to write the second check. The first check then comes through, the second check bounces. Oops!
My landlord usually cashes my rent checks on the 3rd. This month he was out of town so didn't get around to cashing it until the 10th. I checked my balance on the 9th and assuming my rent check had been cashed as usual, that I had enough to write the second check. By the time the second check is cashed, there is no money in my account so it bounces. Oops!
Didn't mean to write a check that would bounce in any of those (imaginary) situations. No intent to write a bad check means no crime of fraud, as fraud requires specific intent to defraud.
Most of those do constitute "not knowing how to add up a list of numbers". Checking your balance before writing a check is not sufficient, as the examples demonstrate. This is almost a perfect example of 'bad faith' e.g. the check writer isn't diligently accounting for all of their expenses.
What you 'mean' to do doesn't matter. Writing more checks than there are deposits to cover, is bad faith.
"Bad faith" requires intent. Carelessness is not "bad faith". It's negligence.
I've had my debit card declined because I'd already withdrawn everything and failed to pay attention to the balance. If I'd written a check instead of using the debit card, it would have bounced instead of being declined. That's not bad faith. It's careless and embarrassing, but not bad faith.
What you 'mean' is the whole point of why it's not bad faith, you have it completely the wrong way round. Bad faith implies that you had an intent not to pay, whereas all the previous examples were of someone writing cheques that they intended to pay.
"Bad faith" means something different than you think it does. It's a willful intent to deceive. It does not cover negligence or carelessness.
I bounced a rent check once. I had forgotten another large check I had written 3 weeks prior, and it got to my account before the rent check did. I wrote both checks in good faith, but failed to do the proper accounting in my ledger.
Compare "Good Faith" that requires a reasonable standard of fair dealing. That would include, adding up a list of numbers before writing a bad check. Its not just negligence when you never had any intention of being diligent. Its willfully ignoring a minimal standard of managing money - adding it up.
If the only defence against the bad check is "I kind of thought I probably had enough money in the account", then that was bad faith - no reasonable standard was achieved.
The way the loan is structured, it's essentially a cheque. If you can be arrested for bouncing cheques, then you can be arrested for not paying the casinos.
But maybe I'm confusing it for: they can't throw you in jail for debts.