Liberal government policies first enabled the cigarette to prevail in American society

‘The Cigarette’ Review: No Smoking, Please: Until the 1960s, liberal government policies ensured the success of the tobacco industry. Then came the surgeon general’s report. Barton Swaim reviews The Cigarette Sarah Milov. Excerpt:

"At the heart of the book is this remarkable irony: Liberal government policies first enabled the cigarette to prevail in American society, then targeted it for destruction. On every other page of the book’s first three chapters, we read of some government board or commission or agency or state-backed association working to protect or strengthen the tobacco industry. During World War I, the War Industries Board gave the tobacco industry preferential treatment, and soldiers received cigs along with other rations. The New Deal introduced an array of laws and regulations (many of them ably explained by Ms. Milov) designed to prop up the tobacco industry. During World War II the federal government drove up the price of tobacco by buying up all the manufacturers’ stock for troops in the war effort. Throughout the latter half of the 20th century tobacco was protected in various ways from foreign competition. An assortment of post-New Deal programs aimed at strengthening farmers—including tobacco farmers—did so by subsidizing them for not producing portions of their acreage. And so on."