# Do the new tobacco warnings violate 1st Amendment rights? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [August 17, 2011, 6:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-the-new-tobacco-warnings-violate-1st-amendment-rights/593003 "2011-08-17T06:58:58Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 1\ **Showing post:** 30
**Author:** ![FinnAgain](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finnagain/32/12500_2.png) [@FinnAgain](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinnAgain)\ **Post date:** [August 17, 2011, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-the-new-tobacco-warnings-violate-1st-amendment-rights/593003/30 "2011-08-17T16:58:22Z")
> [@NotreDame05](#): > > However, the federal government is not permitted to exercise its own discretion as to what is obscene and the Court Irrelevant. We have already established that freedom of speech is not absolute when it comes to commercial products and/or speech in the public domain. And as warning labels on cigarettes already have the force of roughly half a century of precedent and tradition behind them, I still see no actual distinction in terms of kind between written and pictorial warning labels. I also notice that nobody stepping up to the plate for a round of Lawyerball has yet addressed why pictures are somehow a completely different class than written warning labels. I’m hoping for something that doesn’t boil down to “well… one is a picture.” > [@NotreDame05](#): > > The law regulating an advertisement is protected by the 1st Amendment so long as the advertisement concerns lawful activity and is not misleading. A law regulating a lawfu,l non-misleading advertistements must serve 1.) a substantial government interest (2. ) “the regulation directly > advances the governmental interest”; and (3) the governmental interest cannot “be served as well by a more limited restriction on commercial speech.” Yes, thank you for arguing my point, with a citation none the less. The packaging of a commodity is part of how it is advertised. [In fact, it is the tobacco companies themselves who would be the first to argue that packaging is an essential part of how their product is marketed](http://tobaccocontrol.bmj.com/content/11/suppl_1/i73.full). There is a substantial government interest in reducing the number of smokers. Reducing the number of smokers directly advances the government’s interest. And all current warning labels are less forceful, and most likely thereby less effective, than the combination of text and pictorial warning labels. > [@NotreDame05](#): > > Finally, your comment of it is “illegal to show cigarette ads on TV, despite the fact that they rather clearly constitute speech and _not commerce in and of themselves_.”, is a true statement, but it is the fact the advertisement does possess a commerce element to it which makes it different from “pure” speech. Thank you for arguing my point yet again. If an advertisement is not “pure” speech, then surely the packaging of the commercial product itself is even less an act of “pure” speech. The tobacco companies are free to use legal advertising to say “smoking is awesome, yay for smoking!”. They are not free to construct the packing for their commercial product however they wish, and they have not been free to do so for roughly half a century since Surgeon General warnings were placed on them. And as you have now pointed out, freedom of speech is not absolute where commerce is concerned. Obscenity can be limited and curtailed, advertising can be regulated when it’s in the interest of public policy, and the commercial nature of a package of cigarettes makes it distinct from “pure” speech. > [@NotreDame05](#): > > Did you mean to reference examples which undermine your argument and strengthen my position > […] > you cannot simply invoke Congress poewr to regulate interstate commerce and think this resolves the issue. No, and luckily I didn’t. Dodged a bullet there. > [@NotreDame05](#): > > Actually, it is no one may “falsely shouting fire” in a crowded theater. You have got to be kidding me. You are really quibbling over this, you actually thought that I was saying that if there is a raging inferno, it’s illegal to warn other theater goers upon pain of law, and not the fact that shouting “fire!” in a crowded theater is bad if, ya know, there’s no fire? Lawyerball. Gotta love it. --- _[View the full topic](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-the-new-tobacco-warnings-violate-1st-amendment-rights/593003)._