Tobacco.org

• Legal attacks on smoking bans usually fail 

Despite the whining, the last-minute lawsuits, and the general sense of smoker indignation, chances are high that six months from now Ohio will be enforcing a smoking law, and almost everyone will be toeing the line.

That's what's happened in other states where people have been told to step outside if they want to smoke. And both nonsmoking advocates and experts on tobacco litigation predict that will be the case in Ohio.

"This pattern is fairly typical," said Micah L. Berman, executive director of the Tobacco Public Policy Center at Capital University in Columbus.

"Lawsuits are filed at the very last minute, usually as a delaying tactic. They go through the challenges, and they're all rejected," Mr. Berman said.

Stanton Glantz, director of the Center for Tobacco Control Research and Education at the University of California, San Francisco, expects to see Ohio's law make it through challenges.

"I promise you, a year from now, The Blade will run an article saying the law is in force and business is on the increase," the professor of medicine said.

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