Texas may raise legal smoking age from 18 to 19

AUSTIN — Though they are legally considered adults and can serve in the military, 18-year-old Texans would be considered minors when it comes to smoking under a bill passed unanimously through a Senate committee Tuesday.

The measure would increase the legal age for buying tobacco products to 19, and would cut off an estimated $12.5 million in tax revenue for the state over the next two years.

Supporters say raising the legal age will prevent teens from smoking an extra year and keep cigarettes out of high schools, where they can be passed along to younger students.

According to the Department of State Health Services, roughly one-fourth of Texas high school students smoked cigarettes in 2006.

Four other states — Alabama, Utah, Alaska and New Jersey — have raised the smoking age to 19.

In the past, opponents have said that if 18-year-olds are old enough to serve in the military, they should be able to choose whether to smoke.

But at least one senator who opposed the measure on those grounds two years ago has changed his position. Sen. Bob Deuell, R-Greenville, said Tuesday that more information and statistics about teens smoking in high school led him to vote for the measure in committee.

With approval from the Senate Health and Human Services Committee, the proposal now seeks a hearing with the full Senate.

via Texas may raise legal smoking age from 18 to 19 | Front page | Chron.com – Houston Chronicle.

If our laws actually followed the science about the danger to human development and addictiveness of these substances, the legal age for alcohol would be 24, for tobacco it would be 21, and cannabis would be 18.  Personally, I’ve always felt that a set age for mind-altering substance consumption is not the best way to regulate their use.  I know 18-year-olds who are rational and responsible cannabis consumers and I know 40-year-olds who are reckless and embarrassing.

Therefore, I personally think we ought to use educational attainment and employment to grant consumption privileges, up until age 24, when you gain the privilege automatically.  Graduate high school (or GED) and contribute 36-months of part- or full-time payroll taxes into Social Security, or 36-months of 2.5 GPA undergrad classes, and you receive your Consumption License.  If a kid started work at 16 and graduated at 18, by age 19 he’d accumulate 36 months and would be allowed to consume alcohol, tobacco, and cannabis.  If he didn’t start work until after graduation at 18, or decided to go to college, by age 21 he’d earn his Consumption License.  If the kid does nothing but drop out and be a bum, well, then he doesn’t get to party until he’s 24.

Even over 24-year-olds, however, would have to get the license.  The Consumption License would also require its own safety course and registration.  People would get the objective facts about substances, the laws concerning them, instructions for safest use, awareness of addiction and information on treatment and rehabilitation.  People who abuse their consumption license can have it suspended or revoked.  We’d have reliable statistics as to how many people are consuming substances.  The license could have a renewal fee and generate money for the state that would go toward treatment programs.

The added benefit is a bit of coercion for students to stay in school and graduates to go to college or work.  Substance use wouldn’t be seen as a “rite of passage” that comes along automatically at a certain age, but rather as a privilege that is only extended to repsonsible, educated adults.  For those who choose not to use, they don’t have to be taxed to care for the substance users; the users’ Consumption Licenses take care of that.

I can think of all manner of logistical hurdles and political difficulties in instituting such a system, but it makes more sense than just declaring that at a certain age, a human is responsible enough to smoke, drink, and toke.