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• New York Times Obituary is Wrong on Dr. Stewart's Role Regarding Cigarette Health Warnings 

Contrary to the obituary in today's New York Times, former Surgeon General Dr. William H. Stewart did not "put the first health warnings on cigarette packs," notes the public interest law professor who caused the first decline in US smoking by getting free time for antismoking messages on radio and TV.

"Although Dr. Stewart urged health warnings, he had no authority to order them," notes law professor John Banzhaf of George Washington University. In fact, the story is somewhat more complicated, he explains. . . .

Unfortunately, something that Stewart could not have anticipated -- but which Congress should have foreseen -- occurred. Years later the major tobacco companies were successful in defending themselves from law suits claiming that they failed to adequately disclose the dangers of smoking by arguing that they put on their packs exactly the warning Congress had required.

None of this should detract from Stewart's legacy, however, says Banzhaf.

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