Law

After the Attorney General of Massachusetts promulgated comprehensive regulations governing the advertising and sale of cigarettes, smokeless tobacco, and cigars, petitioners, a group of tobacco manufacturers and retailers, filed this suit asserting, among other things, the Supremacy Clause claim that the cigarette advertising regulations are pre-empted by the Federal Cigarette Labeling and Advertising Act which prescribes mandatory health warnings for cigarette packaging and advertising, 15 U.S.C. s 1333 and pre-empts similar state regulations, s1334(b); and a claim that the regulations violate the 1st and 14th Amendments. The district court ruled the court held that restrictions on the location of advertising were not pre-empted by the FCLAA, but that the point-of-sale advertising regulations requiring that indoor advertising be placed no lower than five feet from the floor were invalid because the Attorney General had not provided sufficient justification for that restriction. The 1st Circuit affirmed the former and reversed the later. The Supreme Court held that the FCLAA pre-empts Massachusetts' regulations governing outdoor advertising within 1,000 feet of a school or playground and point-of-sale cigarette advertising.