Indiana Smoking Ban Unnecessary Jobs-Killer
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Kevin Godbee - Nov 29, 2011
- 2 min read
Indianapolis, Indiana – The International Premium Cigar & Pipe Retailers Association says the Indiana prohibitionists who want to pass a more stringent statewide smoking ban are blind to the jobs- and business-killing repercussions such a ban would have throughout the state.
"Our position hasn’t changed: business owners have the right to decide the smoking policies of their own establishments. When the government tells them what to do, it is going too far. Legislated smoking bans are a product of the ‘Nanny State’ and put businesses at risk, jobs in jeopardy, hurt local economies, and leave consumers with no choices," said Bill Spann, CEO of the IPCPR.
Spann said he was speaking on behalf of the more than 2,000 tobacconists who are members of the IPCPR and own neighborhood cigar stores, as well as their customers and the 85,000 Americans employed by the manufacturers, distributors and retailers of premium tobacco products.
"Legislated smoking bans run contrary to the individual rights upon which the United States was built, Spann said. "Besides that, jobs and businesses are at stake with such draconian smoking bans."
Spann cited a Federal Reserve Bank report that used data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics to officially note the negative impact on businesses and jobs that such bans can have on local and statewide economies. He also referred to Indiana’s nonpartisan Legislative Services Agency, which showed that banning smoking in casinos and horse racing establishments could cost the state about $190 million annually.
"If a smoking ban in gambling establishments could negatively impact those businesses, it could easily hurt other adult-oriented businesses, like bars. And since when should veterans and other members of fraternal clubs be denied their enjoyment of premium tobacco products like hand-made cigars and pipe tobaccos?" he asked.
"Why any legislature would let itself become preoccupied with such non-productive measures, is beyond reason. Instead, legislators should be finding ways to create more jobs and raise more tax revenues by boosting Indiana’s economy in a more business-friendly environment, instead of tearing it down," Spann said.
"Finally, when prohibitionists say smoking bans are necessary to limit exposure to secondhand smoke, it should be known that the American Cancer Society, Johns Hopkins University and the University of Washington and others have shown that the federal government’s permissible exposure limits are up to 25,000 times higher than levels for components of secondhand smoke normally found in bars and restaurants that permit smoking.
"For all these reasons, we urge Indiana residents to insist that their state legislators devote their time and energies to creating new jobs and a better business environment to sustain them instead of wasting it on unnecessary jobs-killing legislative proposals," Spann said.
Written by Kevin Godbee
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Ok, so it’s that time of year, as we all know. Family feasts, houses, yards, and big trees festooned with lights and dangling ornaments, just high enough to keep the cats from reaching a paw into the greenery. It’s also the time of year when your pipe-smoking-significant other makes vast hints about a new pipe. That’s to be expected since he or she was a good boy or girl during the year. Yes, ladies smoke pipes, too. Oh, you want an example? Okay, try Actress Greta Garbo, Millicent Fenwick, Mary Frith, and my late grandmother (who died when she was 93) dipped snuff and smoked a cob occasionally. So now that we have settled that the gentler side of life will puff a pipe too, let’s move on to the upcoming biggest holiday of all. Of course, that huge event is brought to us by the hefty fellow in a red suit, puffing his pipe all the way in a sled filled with presents, being led by a reindeer with a red nose. Or some such. That’s Santa Claus, of course. Becoming a bit more serious, Christmas is such a wonderful time for families and friends. It’s also quite special for pipe puffers. For many of us, this brings up a nostalgic look back to our pipe-smoking or cigar-smoking friends who have died during the current year. A great journalist pal whom I often joined in a local brick-and-mortar pipe and cigar shop. I puffed my pipe, and occasional cigar, as he enjoyed a cigar. He died in October and will be missed. On the happier side of things, Christmas is also a time when mind workers of the world renew their collections with fresh additions. Pundit included. A French passion has overtaken Pundit, from reading more Albert Camus, a heavy cigarette smoker, as were many French intellectuals of a certain time. Instead of cigarettes many of us prefer the more relaxed enjoyment of pipes for that “calm and objective judgment” in the comings and goings of the world. This brings me to French pipes. While visiting France once in the long ago, I happened by a “Tabac” shop in Paris, Tabac Des Vosges. I purchased a beauty of a Chacom bent. I also later bought a Ropp made from ancient briar. To learn more about the dawn of briar pipes and beginnings, take a peek at a well-done piece by Davin Hylton in Pipe Line on April 12, 2023, on Saint-Claude, France, the birthplace of briar. Also in the long back when, on a cold Christmas afternoon, Pundit wandered into an Atlanta bricks and mortar pipe shop to look around. There, resting in an enclosed glass counter was an exquisite Comoy. An older gent, smoking a beautiful bent, asked me if I wanted to look at that pipe. It had a $100 price tag. A college student working for a grocery store chain to help with college tuition at the time, Pundit didn’t have one hundred cents, let alone a C note! I declined and found a $5 basket pipe. A Christmas tradition had just begun. Since that early time, Pundit has made it a holiday ritual to either reward himself, or a special friend, with pipe or tobacco. A Claudio Cavicchi would be nice. Just sayin.’ And now for a couple of December-born Pipe Smokers of the Past: Joseph Rudyard Kipling was born on Dec. 30, 1865, and died on Jan. 18, 1936. I always prefer to believe the best of everybody; it saves so much trouble—Rudyard Kipling. Martin Van Buren, born Dec. 5, 1782, and died July 24, 1862, U.S. President, 1837-1841 As to the presidency, the two happiest days of my life were those of my entrance upon the office and my surrender of it—Martin Van Buren. And one more note to recall a deceased World War II veteran who loved William Somerset Maugham, the author. Maugham, a pipe smoker, was born in Paris, France, on Jan. 25, 1874, and died on Dec. 16, 1965. One cool afternoon as the veteran and I talked while sitting in his backyard patio, he looked off into the distance as if studying something. Nothing in particular. Just looking. He turned to me and said if I wanted to learn about life, “read Somerset Maugham.” I did. It wasn’t until late in life that I discovered how easy it is to say, ‘I don’t know’ –W. Somerset Maugham And now a Parting Shot: Any day with an old friend with pipes and tobacco is a good day.
Yeah! What Spann Said!
I can’t believe some people actually think this is a GOOD idea.
I see a revolution coming. And I can’t freaking belive the tipping point is going to be over tobacco…
BOOOOO Indiana.
As I said elsewhere in this publication: the national economy has tanked; real estate has become worthless; Social Security and Medicare are on the brink of total collapse; gasoline is bobbing between $4 and $5 a gallon; we’re engaged in three wars; China has the U.S. by the financial short hairs; unscrupulous corporate pirates (think Bernie Madoff, et al.) have
managed to steal tens of billions of dollars; Lady Ga-ga can earn millions; unemployment is pandemic; diverse natural disasters have ravaged the country; and the threat of terrorism has public transportation in total disarray. Yet politicians busy themselves with legislation like this, which erodes both the local economy and individual freedoms.
One wonders why so much energy is being spent on the issue of smoking, whereas so many other issues with much more import are practically ignored. It certainly isn’t altruism, or motivation to extend lives, and surely not money which can and is drawn through taxation of the very process the politicians seek to end. Something is rotten in Denmark!
Freakin’ liberals…..
Live Free or Die!
As of Jan 2, 2012, a ban prohibiting smoking in all Boise bars and parks just went into effect. some of us went to the City Council in an effort to fight it, but to little avail- the council was uniformly anti-smoking in leaning and those attempting to fight the ban were not organized enough.
ORGANIZE! Here is what I sent to the city council:
To the City Council as per the anti-tobacco legislation,
Long before our Founding Fathers were known as Founding Fathers (even to themselves), they were using, growing and trading in tobacco, and Native Americans were using tobacco before Europeans arrived on this continent. I believe it was Mayor Bieter at the City Hall Hall meeting in October who pointed out that the right to smoke is not in the Constitution. He is right about that, but those of us in tune with the spirit of the Founding Fathers can cite that part of the Declaration of Independence which refers to ‘the pursuit of happiness’ and count that as something beyond mere rhetoric.
It would no more have occurred to these men to ban tobacco anymore than they would’ve considered banning coffee, tea, alcohol or guns. While their world was different from ours, and they could not have forseen the invention of the cigarette- a nicotine delivery system calculated over time for its addictive properties, the Council might take a broader view of all issues relating to tobacco. It might also recognize that just because studies on second-hand smoke have been compiled into books (one with the US Gov’t. stamp of approval), these studies are not necessarily the gospel truth. Their appearance in book form however does tend to create that idea.
Over nine years ago I quit cigarettes while working in a tobacco store where employees and customers smoked at will. The nature of addiction and specific toxicity differ greatly from person to person (this issue never seems to be addressed in anti-tobacco ‘literature’) depending on on the substance and the physical constitution of the individual, but before I quit cigarettes I’d smoked the better part of a pack a day for 20 years. I quit with the help of pipes and cigars, and while the claim might be made that I merely transferred my addiction, I hasten to add that not having the time to smoke during a day or even forgetting to smoke altogether does not seem to be part of the state of addiction.
As someone who enjoys finer tobaccos in moderation I know that there are great distinctions between different forms of tobacco. This is lost on many who simplistically equate any tobacco use with cancer and addiction. Just as there are connoisseurs of wine and beer, there are those for cigars and pipe tobacco, and magazines dealing with these topics have been around for at least 16 years or more and and are now joined by more websites than could be counted. You don’t see magazines or websites devoted to cigarette enjoyment, and there are good reasons for this. Pipe and cigar smokers will however be lumped in with the cigarette smokers- there aren’t proper studies to show that the smoke for these products is noticeably less toxic, and if there were it would not matter to those anti-smoke dogmatists who wave their hands just thinking about the slightest hint of tobacco but have no problem with camp fires or vehicle engine fumes. No one makes the claim that smoking is nutritious or good for you, yet wine and beer drinkers argue similar claims- even with known statistics concerning drunk-driving deaths, domestic abuse and a host of other alcohol-related health issues.
Cigarette smoking has been a dying trend for years. Laws are not needed to hasten its departure, and in the meantime cigarettes are only one more toxic yet legal product available in the marketplace. Zealous guarding of public health in this arena is certainly all about political whims and expedience. Please allow the the few smokers to frequent a tiny minority of bars who cater to them. (How it is constitutional for a business owner to be forced to ban consumption of legal products on his/her premises is completely beyond me). And please do not punish the old man or tobacco geek who likes his pipe or cigar while walking outdoors on the Greenbelt. You will not live appreciably longer in the total absence of tobacco smoke, especially as as it goes the way of the rotary telephone. A little tolerance and magnaminity is not a bad thing.
Thank you for reading,
S. V.
“You don’t see things as they are. You see things as you are.”
-The Talmud
FINALLY- check this out- auto fumes are being found to possibly cause autism, Pre-mature birth and Alzheimer’s. Think cities will try to limit toxics like auto fumes? Of course not, but using such an arguement might prevail in such future anti-tobacco fights. “You city city council members are merely re-arranging the deck chairs on the Titanic regarding public health if you think a ban on smoking is going to amount to a hill of beans!”
I have been at the capitol in Indianapolis for the last three weeks. The feeling here is that the state wide smoking ban will pass. Furthermore, Indianapolis is also seeking to pass a smoking ban in the city. So if the state wide ban fails or bars are exempt they can fall back onto the city ban. All being driven by the fact the super bowl will be held here in two weeks. The state wide smoking ban for the last 6 years has never made it out of committee.