The $1-a-pack cigarette tax increase loses early Election Night lead, likely is extinguished.We come to bury Proposition 29, not to praise it. We also hope that’s what voters have done, although for most of Election Night it seemed as if the $1-per-pack cigarette tax increase was going to pass.
However, by Wednesday morning – after the newspaper, and our editorial lamenting its narrow passage, was delivered to readers’ front porches – the Secretary of State’s Office proclaimed that “100 percent” of precincts had been counted, and Prop. 29 was behind by about as narrow a margin as it had been winning Tuesday night.
We were delighted to see such a reasonable decision by the electorate. But even now we temper our celebration. There still are more votes to count from perhaps hundreds of thousands of mailed-in, dropped-off and provisional ballots, election officials say. Wednesday’s 63,000-vote margin of defeat conceivably could narrow, perhaps even be reversed, in coming days.
Until and unless that happens, we applaud the good judgment of those whose No votes (including 59 percent of the ballots cast in Orange County) seem to have prevailed. The proposition was a treacherous, deceptive and manipulative attempt to extract money from those who own it to use in ways that others find commendable.
It was treacherous because it provided almost no accountability on how the money would be used. It was deceptive in that it would have provided up to $110 million to buy land and buildings for huge for-profit companies. And it was manipulative because it tugged on sympathy for the ill. As we previously stated, Prop. 29 was a bad way to pursue a good thing.
For the record, the Register’s Editorial Board enthusiastically supports cancer research, the ostensible purpose for this tax increase. What we oppose is singling out classes of people for targeted taxes.
So-called sin taxes, such as this additional tax on tobacco products, unjustly punish people who engage in entirely lawful behavior. If our society finds tobacco use evil, a more appropriate approach would be to outlaw it. No one is suggesting such a foolhardy prohibition.
Taxes should be limited to paying for legitimate government functions, which should be limited to protecting peoples’ rights, not punishing their bad habits. We encourage all those who cast Yes votes for Prop. 29 to literally put their own money where their votes were and donate directly to cancer research.
In the meantime, voters should be on alert. Gov. Jerry Brown wants to see another tax increase on the November ballot, again employing the divide-and-conquer strategy by targeting those who earn more than $250,000 a year. This is simply populist thuggery. We oppose it and will urge voters to do the same.
