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Senate unveils tobacco bill
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March 30, 1998: 1:39 p.m. ET
Bill would raise cigarettes by $1.10 a pack but, so far, avoids liability issues
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NEW YORK (CNNfn) - A proposed bill unveiled in the U.S. Senate would raise cigarette prices by $1.10 per pack over the next five years in an attempt to extinguish teen smoking.
The bill, sponsored by Senate Commerce Committee Chairman John McCain (R-Ariz.), is modeled on similar proposals contained in President Clinton's budget offering, which calls for an increase of $1.50 per pack over 10 years.
Additionally, the Senate bill proposed penalties of up to $3.5 billion annually if the cigarette companies fail to meet reductions in youth smoking. Those goals include cutting youth smoking by 15 percent in three years and 60 percent in 10 years.
Limits would be placed on advertising and marketing, and companies would be required to place more explicit health warnings on cigarette packs under the proposed legislation.
McCain's bill would begin the price increases in 1999 at 65 cents per pack and, if fully implemented, would bring in about $92 billion over five years. It does not make any provisions as to how the revenue would be spent but urges it be used for anti-smoking measures.
In prepared remarks to be delivered Monday, White House Chief of Staff Erskine Bowles was expected to say the bill "will lay a strong foundation for further action."
But in his text, Bowles said the McCain bill may not impose strong enough penalties on companies that keep selling tobacco to children.
McCain acknowledged that the bill would be a framework for what will certainly be prolonged Congressional debate. The senator is pushing hard for his committee to begin marking up the bill right away instead of waiting until after Congress' looming two-week recess.
Glaring omission
Left out of the McCain legislation are provisions regarding the civil liability of tobacco companies, the most hotly contested area of tobacco legislation in Washington.
Last June, the tobacco industry worked out a settlement with 39 state attorneys general. Cigarette companies agreed to pay $368.5 billion over 25 years to the government. For its part, the tobacco industry would get legal protections including caps on legal costs, immunity from lawsuits in cases alleging past misconduct, and a ban on class-action suits.
It is those concessions that have raised the legal issue of whether allowing companies such future protection and denying smokers the future right to sue is unconstitutional.
In addition, anti-smoking advocates, including former Food and Drug Administration head David Kessler, believe that tobacco companies should be hit even harder.
Kessler stepped forward to criticize the McCain bill as well. "On the issues that matter most to reduce the number of children who smoke, the bill does not measure up."
McCain and his committee are left to knock heads with various interests about the tobacco industry's annual liability. McCain apparently is looking to allow a yearly limit of $6.5 billion on tobacco industry payments. However, that limit could be raised if the industry doesn't meet teen smoking cessation targets.
-- from staff and wire reports
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