Word: tobacco
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Encouraged by the recent success of states suing tobacco companies for the medical expenses caused by their product, cities nationwide including Chicago, Miami, New Orleans and Atlanta have filed suits against gun manufactures, trying to hold them accountable for the damage guns have done to their respective communities. In a rather predictable response, the National Rifle Association (NRA) has released its political hounds, engaging in a nationwide effort to lobby state legislatures to write laws blocking or preempting litigation...
...recent onslaught of anti-tobacco and anti-gun litigation offers an enticing bandwagon. However tempting any opportunity to finally strike a slow to the hitherto elusive tobacco companies and gun manufacturers may be, the policy of circumventing on augmenting legislature through judicial action sets a policy neither America nor policy neither America nor any legislative democracy can afford...
Lawsuits that essentially punish tobacco companies for selling cigarettes and gun manufacturers for selling guns violate this balance. The movement to litigation stems from frustration with an inability to expand current tobacco and gun control legislation. The current suits represent a blatant attempt to circumvent proper legislative procedure...
...that in selling guns that ultimately end up being used in murders, gun manufacturers violate a written law and can thus be held responsible for the murders in which the guns are used. However, on both a federal and state level, legislatures have explicitly legalized both the sale of tobacco products and firearms, outlining in law which guns and tobacco products can and cannot be sold...
...tobacco suits seem to have a somewhat stronger base at first; it is the product itself, not misuse by its owner, that causes real bodily harm. Still, legislatures aware of the harmful side effects of tobacco products have intentionally refrained from outlawing tobacco distribution, despite prohibitions on other unhealthy drugs such as cocaine, heroine or marijuana. Furthermore, Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulations regarding tobacco production specify which products can be legally distributed. Thus, any decision finding criminal fault in production of products that meet these established standards directly contradicts--or perhaps I should say circumvents--the existing...