Editorial: PACT Act puts a halt to Internet tobacco sales

Opinion

Wednesday, March 17, 2010

"A bill that would ban the shipment of cigarettes and certain tobacco products through the U.S. Postal Service was approved unanimously by the Senate last week. A companion bill was approved by the House last year by a 397-11 vote. The House is now expected to approve the Senate version and send it to President Barack Obama for his signature.

"So it comes down to Obama," Lance Morgan of the Winnebago Tribe of Nebraska told Indian Country Today. "He is an adopted Crow and he says all the right things, but this is real and not the campaign trail."

Indian tribes, which have built a lucrative industry by selling tax-free cigarettes, are asking Obama to send it back to Congress for an amendment exempting Indian tribes, but that would defy present law.

The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 1991 that the doctrine of sovereign immunity of Indian tribes allows a state "to collect taxes on sales to nontribal members," although a state may not impose taxes on cigarettes sold to tribal members on tribal lands.

Smokers have been desperate in recent years to avoid high tobacco taxes in states such as Hawaii. Passage of the bill eliminating the Postal Service as the shipper should eliminate cigarettes made cheap through the Internet."

Get the Story:
Editorial: Ban tobacco from the mail (The Honolulu Star Bulletin 3/17)

Also Today:
Collecting Indian cigarette taxes (The Adirondack Daily Enterprise 3/16)

Prevent All Cigarette Trafficking Act.
H.R.1676 | S.1147