The American Spectator

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Special Report

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Actually, to protect a match producer with a friend in high places, the bill does prohibit any restriction on retailers giving away match books with cigarette purchases. Congress always keeps its priorities straight.

Last year the FDA legislation was appended to a multi- billion dollar bail-out of tobacco farmers. That effort narrowly failed. Now the anti-tobacco crusaders are back.

Smoking is bad for one's health. But people have a right to choose their poison.

The desire to reduce tobacco use is fair enough, but that's what any number of private educational efforts are all about. Government can legitimately bar sales to minors, but the states already do that. Indeed, 1992 federal legislation mandated that states more effectively enforce access laws, resulting in a two-thirds reduction in youth violations over the last decade.

Unfortunately, legislative proposals to allow FDA regulation over cigarettes are really yet another attempt to move to de facto tobacco prohibition.

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