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A must Read!

nivek

New Member
Joined
Nov 6, 2003
Messages
14
DON’T LET CONGRESS TAKE AWAY YOUR CIGARS!

In December, the United States Senate passed a bill dealing with the counterfeiting of cigarettes. A last minute amendment was quietly slipped into this bill (S.1177) to COMPLETELY BAN THE SALE OF CIGARS THROUGH THE US MAIL! The rest of the bill has absolutely nothing to do with cigars. And even worse, the amendment was snuck into the Senate bill without any debate!

Of course this is going to have not only a huge impact on our customers, but on every single cigar smoker in America regardless of who he buys from! Plus no matter how great your local retailer is, there is no way they can stock every brand, nor every size and shape in each brand. Plus, I don't know about you, but I have only one good cigar store within 2 hours of my house, and I know plenty of guys who don't have ANY cigar store within 100 miles of them. And what about our servicemen overseas? US Mail is the only way they get cigars!

Private carriers have already proven they are not willing to stand up to local states and have already stopped accepting cigar shipments in certain places. Honestly, I am just stunned that our government is going to stamp out our freedom to send a perfectly legal product via our tax subsidized US Mail system. And as someone who buys cigars via mail (yes, I buy cigars from other retailers - don't tell Lew...) this whole thing makes me mad as hell. I am truly becoming fed up with the government meddling with my individual rights. The more I think about, the angrier I become...

If this bill passes into law it is going to have a devastating impact on the entire cigar industry and on our individual rights. Well, I am damn well not going to roll over and stick my head in the sand on this. Currently this bill is slated to be considered next by the US House Judiciary Committee under HR2824.

We are all right now sorting out what is the best way to contact the sitting members to let our own voices be heard and we are hopeful that every cigar smoker who reads this will help by doing the same and will pass the word on to others.

Standby for more info - we will publish it as soon as we have it! I don't know if we can stop this lunacy, but I am damn well going to beat the drum like a madman!!!


Here are the SPECIFIC ISSUES:

In the final version of S1177, the PACT Act as PASSED by the Senate is:

SEC. 3. TREATMENT OF CIGARETTES AND SMOKELESS TOBACCO AS NONMAILABLE MATTER.

Section 1716 of title 18, United States Code, is amended-- (1) by redesignating subsections (j) and (k) as subsections (k) and (l), respectively; and (2) by inserting after subsection (i) the following new subsection (j):

``(j)(1) Except as provided in paragraph (2), the transmission in the mails of any tobacco product, including cigarettes (as that term is defined in section 1(2) of the Act of October 19, 1949 (15 U.S.C. 375; commonly referred to as the `Jenkins Act')) and smokeless tobacco (as that term is defined in section 1(3) of that Act), is prohibited, and tobacco products are nonmailable and shall not be deposited in or carried through the mails. ``(2) Paragraph (1) shall apply only to States that are contiguous with at least one other State of the United States.''.


Also buried in:

SEC. 5. COMPLIANCE WITH MODEL STATUTE OR QUALIFYING STATUTE.

© Definitions.--In this section:
(3) Importer.--The term ``importer'' means each of the following: (A) Any person in the United States to whom non-tax-paid tobacco products manufactured in a foreign country, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, or a possession of the United States are shipped or consigned. (B) Any person who removes cigars or cigarettes for sale or consumption in the United States from a customs bonded manufacturing warehouse. © Any person who smuggles or otherwise unlawfully brings tobacco products into the United States.


You can find these yourself in a copy of the final bill as passed:

thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/qu...08:S.1177:


Here are the concerns:

1) The fact they list "any tobacco product" rather than just cigarettes and smokeless products under the non-mailable section. Yes they list the two latter, but they do not limit the first. Instead they just separate it with a comma.

2) The imbedding of the word CIGAR under the importer definition although the bill is suppose to be about cigarette and smokeless taxes.

Now to me these seem to be minor issues, but to those with a better grasp of Congressional law say these two seemingly minor points: one by omission, the other by brief inclusion, spell disaster for us cigar smokers.

Last Wednesday the Cigar Association of America (CAA) met with a cadre of lawyers and the conclusion was made that if the US House passed the law as adopted by the Senate it would make the sale of cigars via mail illegal!

So our intent is to do everything we can to let the HOUSE JUDICIARY COMMITEE, who will be working on the House version of the Bill 2824, know that we do not want their bill to incorporate the language of the senate's final version.

That we want the word CIGAR stricken from it and that there should be NO "any tobacco product" references, but rather that the bill should be specific and exclusively specify cigarettes and smokeless products.

Now the lawyer types can debate it all they want, instead I am going to write the House Judiciary my concerns regarding the pending legislation and do what I can to get them to exclude any reference to cigar and to "any tobacco product."

We will be posting that contact info tomorrow for all.

Thanks,

Steve

ps: And yes, the way I understand it now, it would impact all means of shipment. <sigh>
 
So all means of shipment as in UPS and Fedex as well?


Cause that would really screw everyone over!!!!


Phil
 
Please keep us posted on this one, Steve! I'm not surprised that the committee chaired by good ol' borin' Orrin, one of Utah's senators (and a Mormon) would not seize on this as an opportunity to restrict all tobacco sales.

Doesn't this smell of restraint-of -trade? My concern would be that they would then modify the language to require a signature and ID to receive packages that contain the dreaded weed. That would probably be enough to get many carriers to refuse to accept them for shipment. :angry:
 
nivek said:
Yes Fed ex and UPS Also! The way it is written!
OK so...........


anything we can do to help?? Or must we just sit by our computers and bite our fingernails till the final verdict comes in?


LMK if there is anything (ie. letters or Phone calls) I can do to help


Phil
 
Yes it's bad, but it's not like it's going to go into effect without getting fixed. Every single person in the tobacco business are going to be pissed. It already looks like the cigar trade associations are on it, so I'm sure they will have the connections to get word of the problem to the correct congress members.

If the trade associations and the large retailers can't stop it and the bill proceeds further then we should start sounding the battle cry, but I think it would be early to do a petition or anything of that sort quite yet (unless you have the kind of connections to get a hold of someone on the committee). If it's just a technical language problem, once the committee members are alerted to it they should be able to fix it easily.
 
Can anyone find the list of who voted for what on the senate side? I did a search and can't find the actual rollcall. I would very much like to cut and paste part of the post and ask my senator why he voted for it (assuming he did). Ya it is over but I have been here before and like to keep him on his toes!

Would like to alert my Congresssman to the same as well. I checked and he isn't on the Judiciary committee which would have been nice.

Check to see if your congressman is listed and giver him the heads up if he is.
http://www.house.gov/judiciary/members.htm
 
good to be from WI.
I see 3 people on there from my state.

so far, have not seen any anti-tobacco stuff back home,
will have to e-mail them.
 
I just went though the orginal Senate bill, the amended Senate bill that was passed, and the House bill.

Basically it looks like the Senate original said you couldn't send cigarettes through USPS. It looks like they then amended it to add smokeless tobacco and changed cigarettes to just "tobacco" even though the name of the section wasn't changed. This leads me to believe that they were just widening the scope of what couldn't be mailed to include the smokeless tobacco and someone went too far and changed "cigarettes" to "tobacco" without anyone catching it.

Now, the House bill doesn't have ANY of the text about sending cigarettes in the mail so currently the committee would have to add the exact same text in. Bottom line is that this is still in the early stages of the House - it still has a long way to go and at this point the House committee would have to go out of it's way to add the same text in. If they do do that then we should attack. Right now if you send a letter to your congressperson complaining that you like getting cigars in the mail they aren't going to have a clue what you are complaining about because the current House bill doesn't even say anything about it.

BTW - Even if the Senate bill text about the mail is adopted by the House UPS and FedEx look like they are fine - see the "common carrier" stuff early in the passed Senate bill. Retailers just have to mark the package and some other stuff.

You can view the bills by going to: http://thomas.loc.gov/
In the box for bill number enter:
S1177 for the Senate Bill
HR2824 for the House Bill

I couldn't find who voted for the Senate bill (I really doubt they did a roll call), but I found this: "SA 2231. Mr. FRIST (for Mr. HATCH) proposed an amendment to the bill S . 1177 , to prevent tobacco smuggling, to ensure the collection of all tobacco taxes, and for other purposes. " so it looks like Hatch was responsible for widening it from "cigarettes" to "tobacco"

Disclaimer: I'm not a lawyer.
 
E-mails went out last night to my two senators and rep. Follow-up phone calls today. :angry: :angry: :angry:
 
Keep in mind that even if the House bill does not have the same language, if it passes, the house and senate bills will go to comittee to be merged together. That cold be dangerous. Better to let you rep. know that the Senate bill says such and such and voice your concerns.
 
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