Limitations regarding the use of quotes
The quotes provided here reflect statements from a specific decision. Accordingly, the International Legal Consortium (ILC) cannot guarantee that an appellate court has not reversed a lower court decision which may influence the applicability or influence of a given quote. All quotes have been selected based on the subjective evaluations undertaken by the ILC meaning that quotes provided here may not accurately or comprehensively represent a given court’s opinion or conclusion, as such quotes may have originally appeared alongside other negative opinions or accompanying facts. Further, some quotes are derived from unofficial English translations, which may alter their original meaning. We emphasize the need to review the original decision and related decisions before authoritatively relying on quotes. Using quotes provided here should not be construed as legal advice and is not intended to be a substitute for legal counsel on any subject matter in any jurisdiction. Please see the full limitations at https://www.tobaccocontrollaws.org/about.
Petitioners, citizens of the State of New York who regularly used tobacco products, claimed that the New York State legislature violated their rights to liberty and privacy to smoke when it adopted new regulations prohibiting the smoking of tobacco products in certain public places. The petitioners further alleged that the prohibitions created irrational and capricious restrictions that infringed on their rights to due process and the equal protection of laws. The New York Court of Appeals had previously found that the same restrictions were unconstitutional as passed by an administrative agency, the New York Public Health Council, because the agency's regulations resolved certain social, economic, and political concerns that were uniquely for the state legislature to decide. In the present case, the Supreme Court of Albany County found that the regulations were constitutionally valid because the state legislature possessed the right to pass comprehensive public health regulations and because the regulations derived from rational governmental health concerns without infringing on any of the petitioners' fundamental rights.