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Action on Smoking and Health
A National Legal-Action Antismoking Organization Entirely Supported by Tax-Deductible Contributions
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Big Tobacco Accused of Using Dirty Tricks in Lawsuit to Remove Cig. Tax from MT Ballot [07/28-6]
Excerpts from: Tobacco firms accused of using dirty tricks with ballot lawsuit
Billings Gazette [07/28/04]
Sponsors of an initiative to raise the cigarette tax and use some money for
health care on Tuesday accused tobacco companies of using "the same dirty tricks" in suing to keep it off the ballot.
"Big tobacco has once again shown that when it comes to peddling their deadly product, they will do anything to make sure they hook our kinds," said Dr. Richard Sargent of Helena, treasurer of Healthy Kids Healthy Montana, the group that drafted Initiative 149.
Montanans support increasing tobacco taxes to prevent kids from smoking and using some of the money for the Children's Health Insurance Program, prescription drugs and insurance for small businesses, Sargent said.
On Monday, veterans' groups, tobacco wholesalers, convenience stores and some tobacco companies asked a Helena district judge to remove I-149 from the November ballot as unconstitutional. Leaders of veterans' groups said its passage might jeopardize the current funding of state veterans' nursing homes.
Among the plaintiffs are the American Legion of Montana, the Montana Department of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, the Montana Wholesalers and Distributors Association, the Montana Petroleum Marketers Association or convenience stores, R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Co. and U.S. Smokeless Tobacco Co. While not a plaintiff, Philip Morris USA helped pay for the lawsuit.
They contend the measure's statements of purpose and implication and fiscal statement are biased in favor of the measure. They also contended I-149 is unconstitutional because it appropriates money, which is a responsibility reserved for the Legislature, and contains multiple subjects.
Sargent said I-149 backers crafted the ballot measure to meet all of Montana's legal and technical requirements and it was reviewed by the attorney general's office and approved by the secretary of state's office.
I-149 would more than double the state tax on cigarettes to $1.70 a pack from the current 70 cents and boost taxes on other tobacco products by similar margins.
If passed, I-149 would generate an additional $44.7 million in revenue in its first full year, the governor's Budget Office has estimated. Slightly more than $38.4 million a year would go for programs to provide health insurance to poor children and prescription drugs to poor children, the elderly, chronically ill and disabled. Some money also be targeted for small businesses that provide health insurance for their employees.
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