Kink Friendly Law

Recently, NPR ran a story on-line that R.J. Reynolds is challenging the Constitutionality of specific provisions of the new anti-smoking legislation on First Amendment grounds relating to advertising.

As a practicing attorney I find it disheartening that democratic lawmakers wrote a provision into this new legislation that is potentially open to attack on a Constitutional level, especially in light of a strong precedent seeming to favor the tobacco companies position (See Lorillard Tobacco Co v. Reilly).

I understand the government has an strong social interest in keeping children from being exposed to tobacco advertising geared towards enticing them to try tobacco products, I further understand the governments interest in vigorously sharing the risks of tobacco use and doing what it can to encourage individuals to either stop using tobacco products or to never begin. But in the case I believe this is a classic case of “big government” overstepping and forging ahead with legislation which stands a very good chance having certain provisions eviscerated as being overly broad in a Constitutional sense. This simply wastes time and money when far more complex and far reaching problems need to be addressed.

I would prefer to see the government spend my tax dollars smarter by trying to address the myriad of problems currently facing our county. But then those problems will require hard work and compromise possibly requiring a great deal of both personal and governmental sacrifice which will likely be met with resistance and anger. Which makes a soft target like “evil tobacco” irresistible to a government desperate for a legislative win.

© 2009, edward. All rights reserved.

No related posts.

Related posts brought to you by Yet Another Related Posts Plugin.