Critics are coughing in disgust that the state Supreme Judicial Court has upheld Brookline’s ban on the sale of tobacco products to anyone born this century, while the ruling has placed advocates into a relaxed state of mind.
Justice Dalila Argaez Wendlandt has found the ban to be consistent with a state law prohibiting tobacco sales to people under the age 21, “rationally related to a legitimate government interest” and in line with the Massachusetts Constitution’s equal protection provisions.
State lawmakers voted in 2018 to block the sale of tobacco products to people younger than 21 years old, raising the minimum age requirement from 18.
The so-called “Tobacco Act” preempts any “inconsistent, contrary or conflicting” local law related to the minimum age provision but allows cities and towns to limit and to ban the sale of tobacco products within their municipalities, Wendlandt highlighted in her ruling.
Brookline residents in 2020 approved a bylaw that places tobacco consumers into two groups: people born before 2000 and those born after.
Wendlandt’s ruling Friday came after several Brookline convenience store owners looked for the SJC to declare the ban undermined the state Constitution by dividing adults into two age groups and preempted by the Tobacco Act.
“The bylaw’s birthdate classification, starting in the year 2000, is rationally related to the town’s legitimate interest in mitigating tobacco use overall and in particular by minors,” Wendlandt wrote in her ruling.
“The bylaw also is a rational alternative to an immediate and outright ban on sales of all tobacco products, preserving intown sales to those in group one who may already suffer from addiction,” she added. “And it provides sellers time to adjust to revenue losses that stem from shrinking tobacco product sales.”
Convenience store owners and retailers are blasting the ruling as they say the ban will hurt their businesses while advocates and local officials are applauding the decision as it puts public health at the forefront.
The New England Convenience Store and Energy Marketers Association, a regional industry lobbying group, said it’s “disappointed but not surprised” by the development.
“The Brookline bylaw does not target youth tobacco usage,” the group posted on X late Friday night. “Instead, it bans a growing class of adults from legally purchasing any tobacco or nicotine product in the town. Our retailers will be negatively impacted when they lose customers to neighboring towns.”
Advocates and officials have long viewed Brookline as a leader in tobacco regulation.
The town of roughly 60,000 people, on the border of Boston, became the first municipality in the state to disallow people from smoking in bars and restaurants in 1994. More recently, it banned the sale of flavored tobacco and vapor products in 2019.
Brookline is the first city or town in the country to enact a bylaw that will gradually phase out tobacco use completely, the Boston Globe reported.
“By affirming a lower court’s dismissal of the tobacco industry’s challenge of the bylaw, the state’s highest court validated the town’s legitimate interest in mitigating tobacco use overall, and in particular the case of minors,” Town Counsel Joe Callanan said in a statement.
Tobacco remains the biggest cause of preventable death in the U.S. and the world, the Action on Smoking and Health stated in a release. It also costs the U.S. more than $300 billion annually in health care costs and lost productivity, according to the advocacy group.
Jon Hurst, president of the Retailers Association of Massachusetts, slammed the upholding of the ban, saying it’s taking away freedom of choice from people and small businesses.
“What’s next? Cannabis, alcohol, meat, healthcare services? Local pols completely out of their lane on these issues,” Hurst said in a post on X early Saturday.
The Massachusetts Fiscal Alliance, a conservative fiscal group, added: “A local board of health telling some adults what they can or can’t do, which is legal for other adults. This is complete insanity.”
Brookline’s ban has sparked interest in other towns across the Bay State, with Melrose, Stoneham, Wakefield and Malden all looking to follow suit. Even officials in cities and towns as far away as California are following Brookline’s bylaw.
“This is a watershed moment, and I hope places in California and around the world will be inspired to put an end to the tobacco epidemic once and for all,” Beverly Hills city councilor John Mirisch said in a statement following the SJC decision Friday. Mirisch was mayor when his city ended all tobacco sales in 2021.