Freedom no cheap bargaining chip FINAL Edition

• Published in: USA today (Arlington, Va.)
• Main Author: Gartner, Michael
• Format: Newspaper Article
• Language: English
• Published: McLean, Va USA Today, a division of Gannett Satellite Information Network, Inc 21.05.1996
• ISSN: 0734-7456

On Monday last week, the Supreme Court said you can't ban talk about a product, even one considered a vice, if the product is legal. On Wednesday, Philip Morris U.S.A. asked Congress and the president to ban some talk about cigarettes. Nullifying a 1986 casino decision, the court said you can't ban truthful speech about a legal product. ``We think it quite clear that banning speech (about a product or activity) may prove far more intrusive than banning (the product or activity),'' Justice John Paul Stevens wrote in one of four opinions from a court split in reasoning but unanimous in outcome. ``We reject the assumption that words are necessarily less vital to freedom than actions.'' Days later, Philip Morris asked President Clinton and Congress to ban cigarette billboards near schools, to ban cigarette ads on taxis, buses, trains and subways, and to ban cigarette brand names and characters from T-shirts and hats. And it asked to be banned from sponsoring some sporting events. In other words, it asked Congress to do what the Supreme Court had just said would be unconstitutional.