President Clinton's bold, new plan for battling childhood smoking faces formidable legal challenges from the tobacco and advertising industries. They wasted no time suing, and proclaimed Friday "we are very confident" of victory.
"The legal wars over this broadest censorship attempt ever aimed at American advertising will pay for the college educations of countless lawyers' children," said Daniel Jaffe of the Association of National Advertisers.The tobacco industry's lawsuit contends the Food and Drug Administration has no authority to impose the regulations Clinton wants and calls the proposals an "unlawful effort . . . to usurp the legislative authority of Congress."
"For more than 80 years, Congress has made it very clear that the FDA, which is supposed to regulate pharmaceutical products and medicines should not regulate cigarettes," Steven Parrish, vice president of Philip Morris said.
Parrish told NBC's "Today" show that the industry "had no choice" to sue when the FDA "asserted jurisdiction over us." "We are very confident" of winning that suit," he said.
FDA Commissioner David Kes-sler, making the rounds of morning shows, said "I'm not going to comment on litigation but we certainly hope the industry will work with us."
He said, however, that "a voluntary program just won't work . . . We need a comprehensive policy with enforceable steps."
Anticipating lawsuits, the president offered an alternative to his order for FDA regulations Thursday.
Federal law requires a 90-day comment period.
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Additional Information
Clinton on MTV
President Clinton is doing an interview with MTV tonight to bring his message against youth smoking to the target audience.
The MTV special report will air at 8:30 p.m. MDT, the cable channel said. Clinton will discuss the restrictions on tobacco he ordered Thursday, as well as other issues.