First Amendment
Smoking, Like Murder, Can Only Be Faked Onstage, Colo. Court Says
Posted Mar 21, 2008, 09:20 am CST
By Debra Cassens Weiss
Cigarette smoking is not protected by the First Amendment and neither are Colorado actors who smoke on stage, a Colorado appeals court has ruled.
Some states allow actors to get around smoking bans by barring tobacco but not herbal cigarettes. But the Colorado Court of Appeals said in a ruling yesterday that state law bans all kinds of smoking, with no exemptions, even for actors, the New York Times reports.
The court said the ban on smoking was no different from bans on other illegal activity.
“Murders are not committed, actors do not fire live bullets at each other or at the audience, the theater is not set afire to illustrate the burning of Rome in Julius Caesar,” the court said. “The audience is aware that the scenes are not real.”