Supreme Court Defends Web Cigarette Sales

A Maine law forcing shipping companies to take responsibility for deliveries to minors has been declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court.

The state of Maine may have had good intentions when it enacted a law restricting the sale of tobacco products through the Internet, but the Supreme Court ruled on Wednesday that the law violated a 1994 law governing the transport of goods, according to CNN.

The law made shipping companies, such as UPS and FedEX, responsible for accepting outbound shipments only from licensed tobacco retailers in Maine, and for delivering only to Maine recipients with identification proving they were of age. For the companies, the law represented a new burden in both cost and liability.

A federal appeals court had already made the same ruling against the Maine law, but Wednesday’s Supreme Court ruling sealed the deal. The court cited a 1994 law which says that no state can enact laws “related to a price, route, or service of any motor carrier…with respect to the transportation of property.”

Justice Stephen Breyer acknowledged that Maine created the law out of concern for public health, but disagreed that this umbrella term could be used to make exceptions from other laws.  Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg urged Congress to enact its own solution in her opinion.