Stopping the Clock (Calendar) on Smoking (Tobacco)
or,
You will never be old enough to smoke!
An open letter to state legislators throughout the US:
I would like to suggest that the age at which one can buy tobacco (cigarettes, etc.) should eventually start rising. Stores that sell it have those little signs, worded something like "your birthday must be on or before this date in 1986 to buy tobacco." Why don't you sponsor a bill to fix that year, rather than letting it change every year? Obviously, this would make it illegal, in the future, for some people over the age of 18 to buy tobacco. It might be difficult to start right away, but as there are few current smokers under the age of 10, maybe you could set the upper limit for the year at 1994. Given how long this might take to enacted; maybe we should set a more modest objective and use 2000 instead, so no one born this century would ever be old enough to smoke. With appropriate publicity, that group would know that they could never buy cigarettes, giving them one more reason never to start smoking. Similar campaigns are planned in all states. Allowances would eventually have to be made for immigrant smokers, so holders of foreign passports could be exempt. Those that were naturalized but still addicted could get an appropriate certificate upon naturalization. Please do what you can to make this idea come about.
Sincerely,
Please feel free to copy the body of the letter above and e-mail, fax, or mail it to your state legislators, but please use your name and not mine. They pay more attention if you say you are a registered voter, and include your home address or at least your zip code below your name so they will know you live in their district.
Their websites can often be found at through the state websites that all have the same general form: http://www.state.ny.us/
Just replace the “ny” with your state’s abbreviation, or use your favorite search engine.
You will probably get a form letter response back. If you ever see them in person, tell them about the idea. They will probably say they do not remember your e-mail, so you may have to send it again, but that actually means that their staff did not show it them. They will hear about it when they start getting many similar messages, so encourage your friends and neighbors to send this in as well.