It seems that lawmakers all over the United States are out on a mission – a mission to wage war against cigars. In the last post, I wrote about Baltimore banning the sale of single cigars and instead putting a minimum limit of 5 cigars per sale. Going down south, they are trying to push a similar move in Texas.
Deputy Mayor Pro Tem Dwaine Caraway of Dallas, Texas is proposing a similar measure. He originally proposed to disallow many stores to sell cigars unless the sold them in bundles of at least 5. His reasoning is that there are people in his district who are buying cigars by the piece and then removing the tobacco inside. These people would then replace the tobacco leaves with another sort of leaf – marijuana. Essentially, what Caraway is targeting is the use of drugs, and not really tobacco.
Recent developments have caused a halt in the process, however. According to The Dallas Morning News, the Deputy Mayor has been swayed a bit by tobacco lobbyists:
But when the agenda item came before the council this morning, Caraway, with the blessing of area tobacco industry lobbyists Ken Benson, began to offer an amendment, the details of which weren’t readily clear to us — or several members of the City Council.
So before any action could be taken, the council deferred the item to today’s afternoon session. Then, in the afternoon session, the council delayed the item indefinitely while staff researches legalities surrounding banning tobacco sales.
He is not far from defeated though. He vows he will take things right to President Obama if he needs to.