I do not smoke and I agree that smoking is a health hazard.  However, this legislation is an abridgement of private property rights and will result in more people smoking at home, exposing more children and more non-smoking spouses to second hand smoke.  That is not the desired result, but it is never the less a by-product of this legislation.  

 

This legislation is unconstitutional in that it bans a legal product from consumption in a privately owned business, restaurant, or public place, which is a violation of business owners and citizen's constitutional right to do as they choose with their private property and personal health choices.  This legislation opens the door to all kinds of other regulations and restrictions on private property and individual health choices.  Will we now regulate the amount of food a person can consume or fat content a restaurant can serve on its menu?

 

If this legislation is really concerned about the problem of second hand smoke on non-smokers, it will be extremely detrimental to children, relatives, and spouses living in the home, because the only place on can smoke will be in the car, in the home, or outside.  These bills eventually be struck down and do not address the root problem.  The root problem is tobacco is a health hazard.  One answer would be to create a time line in which the selling of tobacco in the U.S. would end, the workers would be retrained and given time to find another job, the tobacco companies would no longer liable for any future suits, and this problem is over.

 

These bills are flawed, unconstitutional, and will create as many problems as they purport to solve and I can not support them.

Fulton J. Sheen