WEBVTT - FB 102: Holy Smokes: How the YMCA Helped Launch the Tobacco Black Market 0:00:01.560 --> 0:00:04.120 We all need a break from the constant cycle to 0:00:04.240 --> 0:00:08.520 learn something new, to gain new perspectives. The Great Courses 0:00:08.520 --> 0:00:11.399 Plus streaming service is an excellent resource to expand our 0:00:11.440 --> 0:00:14.240 knowledge on a variety of subjects or pick up a 0:00:14.240 --> 0:00:17.239 new hobby. I've been enjoying the Great Courses Plus while 0:00:17.280 --> 0:00:21.360 researching this season of flashback lectures like Playball, the rise 0:00:21.400 --> 0:00:24.720 of Baseball is America's pastime, History of the Supreme Court, 0:00:25.000 --> 0:00:27.920 and Battlefield Europe have helped me connect the dots on 0:00:28.040 --> 0:00:31.680 several stories from history. Right now, they're giving our listeners 0:00:31.680 --> 0:00:35.240 a special limited time offer a free month of unlimited 0:00:35.280 --> 0:00:38.519 access to their entire library. Sign up now through our 0:00:38.560 --> 0:00:41.760 special U r L go to the Great Courses Plus 0:00:41.800 --> 0:00:45.920 dot com slash Aussie. That's the Great Courses Plus dot 0:00:45.960 --> 0:00:49.640 Com slash o z y The Great Courses Plus dot 0:00:49.680 --> 0:01:01.680 Com Slash Aussi authority is in North Carolina first started 0:01:01.720 --> 0:01:05.800 to get suspicious in that's when they noticed two odd 0:01:05.800 --> 0:01:09.120 things near the city of Fayetteville. First, there was an 0:01:09.200 --> 0:01:12.600 unusually large number of cigarettes being sold in the area, 0:01:13.080 --> 0:01:16.640 far more than could be explained by local demand. The second, 0:01:16.880 --> 0:01:19.520 police were stopping a number of vehicles along the local 0:01:19.560 --> 0:01:24.080 interstate highway that were carrying cash, lots of cash. The 0:01:24.160 --> 0:01:28.280 investigation led authorities to a plain, gray brick building. This 0:01:28.360 --> 0:01:31.720 is where investigators say it all started. This business behind 0:01:31.800 --> 0:01:34.520 me here is called free Co is listed on Google 0:01:34.600 --> 0:01:37.199 as a candy business. But authorities say what was coming 0:01:37.240 --> 0:01:40.560 out of here wasn't candy. It certainly wasn't what authorities 0:01:40.640 --> 0:01:44.040 unearthened Fayetteville last year was one of the largest cigarettes 0:01:44.040 --> 0:01:47.480 smuggling rings of its kind. Authorities seized about eight hundred 0:01:47.520 --> 0:01:51.000 and forty tho dollars in cash, eleven vehicles, and four 0:01:51.120 --> 0:01:55.200 hundred thousand cartons of cigarettes and five guns. More than 0:01:55.240 --> 0:01:58.120 two dozen people were arrested in connection with the twelve 0:01:58.200 --> 0:02:03.800 million dollar operation. So why is there so much money 0:02:03.880 --> 0:02:07.000 in moving cigarettes across state borders? Why would someone in 0:02:07.000 --> 0:02:09.720 New York even want to buy the exact same cigarettes 0:02:09.760 --> 0:02:12.520 from North Carolina that they can buy at home, And 0:02:12.600 --> 0:02:14.960 most importantly, how did we get in this mess in 0:02:14.960 --> 0:02:18.280 the first place. The answer, as we shall see, involves 0:02:18.280 --> 0:02:22.280 a potent combination of taxes, war, and big business. But 0:02:22.400 --> 0:02:25.560 most of all, the rampant cigarettes smuggling in America today 0:02:25.800 --> 0:02:29.680 is the unintended product of good intentions and if you're 0:02:29.720 --> 0:02:32.480 looking for someone to blame, you could accuse everyone from 0:02:32.480 --> 0:02:35.639 the smuggler to the tobacco industry to the tax collector. 0:02:36.200 --> 0:02:38.919 But before you point any fingers, let me first tell 0:02:38.960 --> 0:02:41.400 you a little story about the y m c A. 0:02:47.360 --> 0:02:51.360 I'm Sean Braswell. Welcome to Flashback, a history podcast from Aussie. 0:02:51.840 --> 0:02:53.720 This season, we are diving deep into some of the 0:02:53.720 --> 0:02:58.200 most remarkable and unsettling examples of unintended consequences from history. 0:02:58.720 --> 0:03:01.800 In this episode, we'll see how an enormous active virtue 0:03:01.840 --> 0:03:04.160 by the y m c A more than a century 0:03:04.200 --> 0:03:08.120 ago continues to lead to all manner of vice, including 0:03:08.400 --> 0:03:16.600 that cigarette smuggling operation in Fayetteville, North Carolina. The reason 0:03:16.639 --> 0:03:19.880 that criminal operations like the one in Fayetteville exists is 0:03:19.880 --> 0:03:23.519 pretty simple. The federal government imposes attacks on cigarettes. That's 0:03:23.520 --> 0:03:26.120 a dollar and one cent per pack. Thomas E. Hall 0:03:26.200 --> 0:03:29.400 is an emeritus economics professor at the University of Miami, 0:03:29.480 --> 0:03:33.720 Ohio and the author of Aftermath, The Unintended Consequences of 0:03:33.800 --> 0:03:36.240 Public Policies. But it doesn't matter where you buy them. 0:03:36.240 --> 0:03:38.200 In the United States, you're gonna pay the federal tax. 0:03:39.000 --> 0:03:43.440 What differs are these state taxes and the state taxes 0:03:43.560 --> 0:03:46.640 on cigarettes very a great deal. Some states are low 0:03:46.720 --> 0:03:50.520 tax states, some like New York, are not. The state 0:03:50.600 --> 0:03:53.360 of New York adds attacks of four dollars and thirty 0:03:53.400 --> 0:03:56.480 five cents to a pack of cigarettes. Then the City 0:03:56.520 --> 0:03:59.720 of New York also taxes, and they had an additional dollar. 0:03:59.760 --> 0:04:01.720 And if he sent signed to a pack of cigarettes. 0:04:02.240 --> 0:04:04.200 So that means if you bought a pack of cigarettes 0:04:04.240 --> 0:04:07.280 in New York City, uh, there's five dollars and five 0:04:07.320 --> 0:04:10.080 cents of taxes on a pack. Were close to sixty 0:04:10.120 --> 0:04:13.520 dollars of tax per carton. North Carolina, on the other hand, 0:04:13.640 --> 0:04:16.800 collect only about five dollars in tax per carton. I 0:04:16.839 --> 0:04:18.720 may be a history buff, but even I can do 0:04:18.760 --> 0:04:22.080 that math. Smugglers can make up to fifty five dollars 0:04:22.080 --> 0:04:25.839 per carton selling North Carolina cigarettes in New York. And 0:04:25.880 --> 0:04:29.240 if each truck of black market cigarettes carries about fifty 0:04:29.240 --> 0:04:33.200 thou cartons, then you're talking about two point seven million 0:04:33.279 --> 0:04:38.120 dollars in potential profit per truck. Two point seven million 0:04:38.200 --> 0:04:41.240 dollars per truck. So you can see what's going on here. 0:04:41.279 --> 0:04:44.599 You have this this profit opportunity. To say the least, 0:04:45.120 --> 0:04:48.840 there's more than just an opportunity, there's an easily moved commodity. 0:04:49.320 --> 0:04:53.680 Cigarettes are a product that are very easy to move 0:04:53.720 --> 0:04:57.880 around because they're they're light, um, they're small, and they're durable. 0:04:58.400 --> 0:05:01.520 This sort of tax arbitrage opportunity and can play out 0:05:01.560 --> 0:05:04.360 even within a radius of a few miles. I live 0:05:04.400 --> 0:05:07.400 in Cincinnati, Ohio, and Cincinnati, Ohio is a river town. 0:05:07.400 --> 0:05:11.400 It's on the Ohio River, and across the river is 0:05:11.440 --> 0:05:16.279 the state of Kentucky. Now, Kentucky is a tobacco grower. 0:05:16.800 --> 0:05:19.240 There's a big crop down there, so, needless to say, 0:05:19.279 --> 0:05:22.160 the Kentucky state legislature has an interest in keeping its 0:05:22.200 --> 0:05:26.599 tobacco farmers happy. Now, that means that the taxes on 0:05:26.640 --> 0:05:28.680 tobacco are not as high in Kentucky as they are 0:05:28.800 --> 0:05:31.720 aren't Ohio. In fact, it's a difference about fifty cents 0:05:31.720 --> 0:05:34.560 a pack, which means if you're a smoker in Cincinnati, 0:05:34.720 --> 0:05:36.480 all you have to do to save fifty cents for 0:05:36.520 --> 0:05:39.360 a pack of cigarettes or five dollars for a carton 0:05:39.760 --> 0:05:43.760 is drive across the John A Robling suspension bridge to Kentucky. 0:05:44.000 --> 0:05:47.040 And when you cross one of those bridges, you'll find 0:05:47.360 --> 0:05:51.039 one liquor and tobacco store after another right there by 0:05:51.080 --> 0:05:54.400 the river. But the real opportunity for smugglers is moving 0:05:54.440 --> 0:05:57.320 cigarettes from a low tax state like North Carolina where 0:05:57.360 --> 0:05:59.800 I live, and a high tax one like New York. 0:06:00.480 --> 0:06:02.359 I asked Hall if I should be getting in on 0:06:02.400 --> 0:06:05.479 the action. If you could keep the mafia off your back, 0:06:05.560 --> 0:06:09.039 you can make one helpful lot of money moving cigarettes 0:06:09.120 --> 0:06:11.880 up to New York. It's a dangerous business, though, I 0:06:11.880 --> 0:06:13.960 guess I'll pass. So how did we get in this 0:06:14.040 --> 0:06:18.920 bizarre tax situation in America? The US first started taxing 0:06:18.960 --> 0:06:21.680 tobacco to help raise money for the Civil War, and 0:06:21.720 --> 0:06:23.960 they continued to do so after the war was over. 0:06:24.279 --> 0:06:27.560 Thomas Holligan. Essentially, what the government discovered was that this 0:06:27.600 --> 0:06:31.000 was a great revenue raiser. By nineteen thirty, tobacco taxes 0:06:31.040 --> 0:06:34.400 were generating about fifteen percent of the federal government's tax 0:06:34.440 --> 0:06:38.640 collections four hundred and fifty million dollars of annual revenue 0:06:38.720 --> 0:06:42.599 for about seven billion dollars worth today, and soon states 0:06:42.600 --> 0:06:45.760 wanted in on the action. To The first state cigarette 0:06:45.800 --> 0:06:49.719 taxes popped up in nearly nineteen twenties, and the reason 0:06:49.760 --> 0:06:52.479 why they did was because we had a fairly bad 0:06:52.480 --> 0:06:57.200 recession from nineteen twenty to twenty one, and during economic recessions, 0:06:57.400 --> 0:07:00.680 revenue to governments goes down. The states were trying to 0:07:00.680 --> 0:07:03.880 close their budget upsets, so they decided to start taxing cigarettes. 0:07:04.360 --> 0:07:07.279 In nineteen one, Iowa became the first state to enact 0:07:07.279 --> 0:07:10.960 the state level cigarette tax. By the nineteen thirties, more 0:07:11.000 --> 0:07:14.560 than thirty other states had followed. The original cigarette taxes 0:07:14.600 --> 0:07:16.440 were pretty low. We're just talking about a few pennies 0:07:16.480 --> 0:07:20.240 on the pack. But that's all it took to get 0:07:20.280 --> 0:07:25.640 the smuggling started. Because once you impost higher taxes in 0:07:25.680 --> 0:07:28.600 one area than another, then you have this opera economic 0:07:28.640 --> 0:07:31.119 consent of to buy the cigarettes in the low cost 0:07:31.200 --> 0:07:34.240 area and try to sell them in the high cost area. Still, 0:07:34.360 --> 0:07:37.480 there wasn't a whole lot of money in smuggling cigarettes yet, 0:07:38.040 --> 0:07:42.160 and most smugglers were still small time criminals. Meanwhile, the 0:07:42.200 --> 0:07:46.600 popularity of cigarettes in America continued to soar even doctors 0:07:46.640 --> 0:07:50.200 recommended them. Time out for many men of medicine usually 0:07:50.200 --> 0:07:53.960 means just long enough to enjoy a cigarette, and because 0:07:54.000 --> 0:07:56.920 they know what a pleasure it is to smoke a mild, 0:07:57.040 --> 0:08:01.120 good tasting cigarette, they're particular about the brand. They choose 0:08:01.800 --> 0:08:06.280 more doctors smoke camels than any other cigarette. Yes, you 0:08:06.400 --> 0:08:10.000 heard that right. Then in the mid nineteen sixties, a 0:08:10.080 --> 0:08:13.440 landmark event occurred, one that would prompt several states to 0:08:13.520 --> 0:08:17.800 raise their cigarette taxes even higher. The reason why was 0:08:17.840 --> 0:08:21.200 because the famous Surgeon General's Report of nineteen sixty four 0:08:21.240 --> 0:08:25.400 came out. This book, containing three seven carefully worded pages, 0:08:25.440 --> 0:08:28.960 as a federal government report. It was released at noon 0:08:29.000 --> 0:08:32.440 today and it says, in view of the continuing and 0:08:32.480 --> 0:08:35.480 mounting evidence from many sources, it is the judgment of 0:08:35.520 --> 0:08:40.160 the committee that cigarettes smoking contributes substantially to mortality from 0:08:40.240 --> 0:08:44.560 certain specific diseases and to the overall death rate. That 0:08:44.880 --> 0:08:48.480 is the basic conclusion. That was the study that linked 0:08:48.720 --> 0:08:52.480 tobacco consumption to all kinds of health problems. And when 0:08:52.520 --> 0:08:55.800 that study came out, then people began to say, hey, 0:08:55.840 --> 0:08:58.280 you know, we ought to try to discourage smoking. It's 0:08:58.400 --> 0:09:01.160 very bad for people, and how can we discourage it. Well, 0:09:01.200 --> 0:09:03.679 one way is to raise the price of it by taxes. 0:09:04.120 --> 0:09:06.440 The Surgeon General and states like New York had good 0:09:06.440 --> 0:09:09.360 intentions to warn people about the harms of smoking and 0:09:09.440 --> 0:09:12.120 to price them out of it. But the price difference 0:09:12.160 --> 0:09:15.480 between states grew as a result. It was that wider 0:09:15.520 --> 0:09:19.840 differential into prices that increase the profitability of smuggling. And 0:09:19.880 --> 0:09:22.000 that's when the organized crime figures got into it in 0:09:22.000 --> 0:09:24.280 a big way. And where did these smugglers see a 0:09:24.360 --> 0:09:30.040 unique opportunity. Nope, not in North Carolina reservations. The Indian 0:09:30.080 --> 0:09:35.240 reservations are not required by law to assess the state taxes, 0:09:36.080 --> 0:09:39.920 and they govern their own territories and they are not 0:09:40.080 --> 0:09:44.000 subject to the state laws. So a pack of cigarettes 0:09:44.040 --> 0:09:46.240 will show up on this Indian reservation in New York 0:09:46.679 --> 0:09:49.440 and no state tax has been paid on it. So 0:09:49.760 --> 0:09:53.920 if if Joe consumer walks onto the reservation, they can 0:09:54.000 --> 0:09:57.520 buy a pack of cigarettes without paying the New York 0:09:57.559 --> 0:10:01.120 state tax. And so a reservation becomes a giant costco 0:10:01.240 --> 0:10:07.559 for cigarettes. One reservation in New York is the Poospatuck 0:10:07.760 --> 0:10:13.280 Reservation on Long Island. It's one square mile of territory, 0:10:13.520 --> 0:10:17.320 has two hundred and seventy residents. And when somebody was 0:10:17.360 --> 0:10:20.280 looking into this about ten years ago, they discovered that 0:10:20.320 --> 0:10:23.319 they had in one year, imported one hundred million packs 0:10:23.360 --> 0:10:26.960 of cigarettes. Overall, it's estimated that New York State loses 0:10:27.000 --> 0:10:30.640 nearly one billion dollars in tax revenue per year because 0:10:30.679 --> 0:10:33.880 of cigarette smuggling, and experts say that governments lose more 0:10:33.920 --> 0:10:37.440 than forty billion dollars worldwide. But what makes it even 0:10:37.440 --> 0:10:40.959 worse is where the money goes instead, there's a lot 0:10:41.000 --> 0:10:42.720 of profits to be had here. When there's a lot 0:10:42.760 --> 0:10:46.920 of profits to be had, illegally, um questionable characters will 0:10:46.960 --> 0:10:49.400 get involved in it. Remember the first bombing of the 0:10:49.400 --> 0:10:52.880 World Trade Center in New York, back the one where 0:10:52.960 --> 0:10:55.920 terrorists plays a truck bomb in the parking garage underneath 0:10:55.920 --> 0:10:58.960 the building. When the investigators went to the apartment of 0:10:59.000 --> 0:11:02.480 those uh, those men who had done that dastardly deed, 0:11:02.800 --> 0:11:06.120 they found phony cigarette stamps in there. They were apparently 0:11:06.120 --> 0:11:10.080 involved in cigarette smuggling. That's just one example. The Irish 0:11:10.120 --> 0:11:15.240 Republican Army back under hey Day was smuggling cigarettes. Saddam 0:11:15.320 --> 0:11:19.160 Hussein was a cigarette smuggler. In fact, his son who Day, 0:11:19.240 --> 0:11:22.840 was running the operation. It gets worse. They caught a 0:11:22.840 --> 0:11:24.960 guy up in New York a few years ago. He 0:11:25.000 --> 0:11:29.520 was smuggling cigarettes and using the proceeds to fund scholarships 0:11:29.600 --> 0:11:32.480 at terrorist training camps in Afghani Stands. In the year 0:11:32.480 --> 0:11:35.960 two thousand smugglers involved in another eight billion dollar ring 0:11:36.080 --> 0:11:39.240 were arrested here in North Carolina. Where were they sending 0:11:39.240 --> 0:11:46.600 their profits to the terrorist group has blah? So the 0:11:46.640 --> 0:11:50.160 government decides to tax cigarettes. Different states tax them at 0:11:50.200 --> 0:11:55.079 different levels, and ban smuggling. Becomes a multibillion dollar industry, 0:11:55.360 --> 0:11:58.240 one whose proceeds can be seen everywhere from reservations to 0:11:58.440 --> 0:12:01.520 terrorist training camps. But that's only part of the story. 0:12:02.120 --> 0:12:04.960 The reason that cigarettes first became so popular in America 0:12:05.320 --> 0:12:08.320 and such a prime target for taxation by different states, 0:12:08.760 --> 0:12:11.760 can be traced back to World War One. That's where 0:12:11.760 --> 0:12:26.480 this problem really starts and our story truly begins. Do 0:12:26.520 --> 0:12:30.200 you have an interesting tale about unintended consequences from history 0:12:30.400 --> 0:12:32.600 or your own life, Please share it with us by 0:12:32.679 --> 0:12:36.559 emailing flashback at Aussie dot com. That's flashback at o 0:12:36.800 --> 0:12:53.960 z y dot com. Cigarettes may be found by the 0:12:53.960 --> 0:12:57.920 truckload on some Native American reservations, but there's one place 0:12:58.040 --> 0:13:00.440 you don't see them nearly as much as you used to. 0:13:00.960 --> 0:13:03.920 I remember it as a young lieutenant, you know, the 0:13:03.920 --> 0:13:06.360 the the and and hearing the stories from some of 0:13:06.360 --> 0:13:10.000 the older guys about how everyone pretty much smoked in 0:13:10.040 --> 0:13:13.240 the military. This is Joel Bias, the lieutenant colonel in 0:13:13.240 --> 0:13:16.200 the United States Air Force. He's also a professor at 0:13:16.200 --> 0:13:20.600 their Air Command Staff College. And you watch the movies, 0:13:20.720 --> 0:13:24.120 or you watch documentaries, or you think back to World 0:13:24.160 --> 0:13:27.960 War Two, et cetera, just how different it is now. 0:13:28.679 --> 0:13:32.640 It's hard to find, especially an officer that smokes, especially 0:13:32.760 --> 0:13:38.000 smokes in uniform UM, whereas forty years ago, in my business, 0:13:38.040 --> 0:13:40.840 it would be probably hard to find a person in 0:13:40.920 --> 0:13:44.520 uniform that didn't smoke cigarettes. Bias wrote a book called 0:13:44.559 --> 0:13:46.760 Smoke Him, If You Got Him, The Rising Fall of 0:13:46.760 --> 0:13:49.959 the Military Cigarette Ration. It looks at how the history 0:13:49.960 --> 0:13:54.360 of cigarettes in America is closely connected to the armed forces. Obviously, 0:13:54.440 --> 0:13:57.960 tobacco has a storied history in America going back to 0:13:58.600 --> 0:14:02.120 the very beginning with the Mayflower and the Pilgrims in 0:14:02.160 --> 0:14:07.120 the early founders UM. But for most of that sev. 0:14:07.440 --> 0:14:12.280 Eighteen hundreds, it was not manu what we call today 0:14:12.280 --> 0:14:16.679 a manufactured cigarette. And why weren't manufactured cigarettes all that 0:14:16.760 --> 0:14:20.120 popular in early America, Well, it's because it was seen 0:14:20.160 --> 0:14:24.520 as effeminate, meaning to smoke a cigarette was seeing something 0:14:24.560 --> 0:14:28.080 that uh, a dandy would do. It wasn't seen as 0:14:28.200 --> 0:14:31.400 very masculine or manly to be smoking a cigarette. In fact, 0:14:31.520 --> 0:14:34.760 prior to World War One, cigars, pipes, and chewing tobacco, 0:14:35.080 --> 0:14:39.520 not cigarettes, were the predominant nicotine delivery devices in America. 0:14:39.680 --> 0:14:42.480 But it wasn't just effeminate cigarette smokers that were viewed 0:14:42.520 --> 0:14:47.440 differently by Americans. Soldiers were two. So when America entered 0:14:47.440 --> 0:14:50.800 the war against Germany in nineteen seventeen and started drafting 0:14:50.840 --> 0:14:52.760 young men to fight in it, there were lots of 0:14:52.760 --> 0:14:56.440 American mothers worried about what sort of morally compromising behavior 0:14:56.480 --> 0:14:59.760 their sons would encounter even before they left camp for 0:15:00.000 --> 0:15:03.880 actual combat. And of course, the great concerns at the 0:15:03.960 --> 0:15:06.440 time for these progressives is they're bringing these millions of 0:15:06.480 --> 0:15:09.560 soldiers into camp and training them for war. Is the 0:15:09.600 --> 0:15:14.720 scourge of alcohol, prostitution, and idleness. The same Christian progressive 0:15:14.760 --> 0:15:16.760 temperance groups like the y m c A that would 0:15:16.840 --> 0:15:20.160 later help get prohibition passed in America set out to 0:15:20.200 --> 0:15:23.280 reform the business of war, and one of the great 0:15:23.280 --> 0:15:29.440 concerns of the this movement was the the ability of 0:15:29.560 --> 0:15:34.880 young men to be morally and physically healthy. And thanks 0:15:34.920 --> 0:15:37.760 to their lobbying, the U. S. Army prohibited alcohol near 0:15:37.800 --> 0:15:41.040 training camps, made sure that any brothels within ten miles 0:15:41.040 --> 0:15:43.440 of a camp were shut down. Even the U S 0:15:43.440 --> 0:15:47.360 Secretary of War Newton Baker was involved. He gives a 0:15:47.440 --> 0:15:50.720 speech to mothers and about the draft on what's going on, 0:15:50.760 --> 0:15:54.920 and says, I'm gonna give your young men invisible armor. Uh. 0:15:54.960 --> 0:15:57.040 And you would think he might be talking about to 0:15:57.120 --> 0:15:59.880 save them from the death, you know, casualties and calm 0:16:00.040 --> 0:16:02.760 at shrapnel, etcetera. But now he was talking about a 0:16:02.840 --> 0:16:08.520 moral invisible armor to protect him from the the negative 0:16:08.680 --> 0:16:11.480 moral effects that could happen for me in the military 0:16:11.480 --> 0:16:14.240 and the war. But soldiers at war needs some form 0:16:14.280 --> 0:16:18.080 of creature, comfort or distraction. The British and French soldiers 0:16:18.120 --> 0:16:21.280 certainly had theirs. The British soldiers had got their own 0:16:21.440 --> 0:16:25.800 ration every day, and the French soldiers had state sponsored brothels, 0:16:25.840 --> 0:16:28.840 where the Newton Baker in the United States government is 0:16:28.880 --> 0:16:32.600 not gonna truck with that. But they do allow cigarettes 0:16:32.680 --> 0:16:37.560 to start being sold in the post exchange. That's right. 0:16:37.840 --> 0:16:42.000 Cigarettes smoking became The American soldiers sanctioned vice during World 0:16:42.000 --> 0:16:45.080 War One, and the group in charge of providing the smokes, 0:16:45.760 --> 0:16:50.080 the y m c A. You know, history is often 0:16:50.160 --> 0:16:52.560 irony and tragedy, and that's one of the ironic things 0:16:52.560 --> 0:16:56.360 of history. Is one of the leading edge progressive organizations 0:16:56.440 --> 0:17:02.440 concerned with soldiers health, morale, you know, morality becomes one 0:17:02.480 --> 0:17:06.639 of the leading providers of the manufactured cigarettes starting in 0:17:06.640 --> 0:17:09.560 World War One. There were good reasons in nineteen seventeen 0:17:09.600 --> 0:17:12.160 to believe that cigarettes were the least worst option as 0:17:12.200 --> 0:17:15.400 far as soldiering vices, and they might even be helpful. 0:17:15.720 --> 0:17:19.040 Smoking a cigarette has a pharmacological effect. It causes the 0:17:19.080 --> 0:17:23.120 blood vessels to to constrict, and it has a bit 0:17:23.160 --> 0:17:28.359 of you know, relaxing calming um sensation to it. They're 0:17:28.400 --> 0:17:32.199 made to be the smooth and desirable, deeply inheld and 0:17:32.240 --> 0:17:37.400 they give that relaxing euphoria kind of feelings. Obviously, there's 0:17:37.440 --> 0:17:40.159 some stress involved in soldiering, especially in the type of 0:17:40.160 --> 0:17:43.760 trench warfare situation that many soldiers found themselves in when 0:17:43.760 --> 0:17:46.919 they got to Europe. You've got jittery hands, you know, 0:17:47.040 --> 0:17:48.800 and you're on the front lines and you're trying to 0:17:49.040 --> 0:17:51.919 shoot a rifle. Smoking a cigarette calming to hands is 0:17:52.520 --> 0:17:54.200 something that you might want to have. And then there's 0:17:54.240 --> 0:17:57.359 also just boredom. The y m c A dispensed around 0:17:57.359 --> 0:18:01.280 two billion cigarettes to soldiers. Eventually the army took over 0:18:01.560 --> 0:18:05.640 and included cigarettes in their standard ration. In total, around 0:18:05.720 --> 0:18:09.240 seven billion cigarettes were distributed, and when the war ended, 0:18:09.560 --> 0:18:13.440 the soldiers returned victorious and with a new habit. After 0:18:13.520 --> 0:18:17.520 War one, seeing all the dough boys smoking cigarettes, coming 0:18:17.560 --> 0:18:21.720 home with a cigarette in their mouth, um continuing to smoke, 0:18:22.200 --> 0:18:26.360 it was considered manly, something that someone with very positive 0:18:26.440 --> 0:18:30.199 character at morals UH engaged in. In fact, it was, 0:18:30.720 --> 0:18:33.479 you know, a desirable kind of trade, you know. And 0:18:33.880 --> 0:18:35.960 what emerges is is, hey, i can just put a 0:18:35.960 --> 0:18:40.280 cigarette in my mouth and I'm instantly considered masculine or manly. 0:18:40.720 --> 0:18:43.240 And so, thanks to the Y m c A, the U. S. 0:18:43.359 --> 0:18:46.520 Army and others, America emerged from World War One with 0:18:46.680 --> 0:18:51.280 millions of new and very manly nicotine addicts. And away 0:18:51.320 --> 0:18:53.440 we go in the nineteen twenties and thirties to where, 0:18:53.480 --> 0:18:56.359 by the time we get to World War two, manufactured 0:18:56.400 --> 0:19:01.920 cigarette smoking is a normative behavior and it profitable industry, 0:19:02.520 --> 0:19:06.040 very profitable, so profitable that the government decided it needed 0:19:06.080 --> 0:19:08.159 to take a larger piece of the action from the 0:19:08.200 --> 0:19:14.760 pool of addicts it had helped create. So how is 0:19:14.800 --> 0:19:17.760 this for a tale of good intentions gone dreadfully wrong. 0:19:18.280 --> 0:19:20.119 The y m C, a of all groups, starts to 0:19:20.160 --> 0:19:22.960 hand out cigarettes to soldiers during the First World War. 0:19:23.440 --> 0:19:26.920 They want to make their struggle more manageable. Instead, they 0:19:26.920 --> 0:19:30.320 create an army of new addicts, addicts increasingly willing to 0:19:30.359 --> 0:19:32.800 fork over millions of their hard earned dollars to the 0:19:32.840 --> 0:19:37.600 tobacco companies who make cigarettes and the governments that tax them. 0:19:37.640 --> 0:19:40.159 Once the harms of smoking become a parent, the surgeon 0:19:40.240 --> 0:19:43.000 general and state government step in to try to discourage 0:19:43.040 --> 0:19:46.199 the use of cigarettes. They pass even higher taxes in 0:19:46.280 --> 0:19:49.560 some states. But what does this accomplish. They create a 0:19:49.560 --> 0:19:54.600 massive opportunity for smugglers, organized crime, and terrorists, one that 0:19:54.640 --> 0:19:57.920 continues until this day. Is there anything that can be 0:19:57.960 --> 0:20:00.240 done about this? And have we learned our us and 0:20:00.240 --> 0:20:03.240 about when a virtuous act can actually lead to more vice? 0:20:03.840 --> 0:20:06.520 And what sorts of substances should we be handing out 0:20:06.520 --> 0:20:21.840 to our armed forces? That's next. We all need a 0:20:21.880 --> 0:20:25.159 break from the constant cycle to learn something new, to 0:20:25.280 --> 0:20:29.480 gain new perspectives. The Great Courses Plus streaming service is 0:20:29.480 --> 0:20:32.200 an excellent resource to expand our knowledge on a variety 0:20:32.240 --> 0:20:35.280 of subjects or pick up a new hobby. I've been 0:20:35.359 --> 0:20:37.960 enjoying the Great Courses Plus while researching this season of 0:20:38.040 --> 0:20:42.760 flashback lectures like Playball, the Rise of Baseball is America's Pastime, 0:20:43.160 --> 0:20:46.560 History of the Supreme Court, and Battlefield Europe have helped 0:20:46.600 --> 0:20:50.320 me connect the dots on several stories from history. Right now, 0:20:50.320 --> 0:20:53.480 they're giving our listeners a special limited time offer a 0:20:53.640 --> 0:20:57.520 free month of unlimited access to their entire library. Sign 0:20:57.600 --> 0:21:00.320 up now through our special U r L to the 0:21:00.359 --> 0:21:04.280 Great Courses Plus dot Com Slash Aussie. That's the Great 0:21:04.280 --> 0:21:08.160 Courses plus dot Com Slash o z Y the Great 0:21:08.160 --> 0:21:15.120 Courses Plus dot Com slash As. According to Thomas Hall, 0:21:15.400 --> 0:21:18.320 there's only one fool proof way to curtail the massive 0:21:18.320 --> 0:21:21.280 cigarette smuggling we see today. If you want to take 0:21:21.320 --> 0:21:23.359 away the smuggling, you way you do it is you 0:21:23.400 --> 0:21:25.960 take away the profit opportunity. And to take away the 0:21:25.960 --> 0:21:30.440 profit opportunity is to take away these tax differentials. You'd 0:21:30.440 --> 0:21:32.640 get a little rid of a lot of smuggling if 0:21:32.680 --> 0:21:36.199 every state and locality had the same cigarette tax. But 0:21:36.280 --> 0:21:39.800 how realistic is that? Anyway? That will probably never happen 0:21:39.920 --> 0:21:42.880 because you have totally different interest groups that work here, 0:21:42.960 --> 0:21:47.320 the tobacco producing states do not want high cigarette taxes. 0:21:48.200 --> 0:21:50.480 The tobacco consuming states are the ones who want that. 0:21:51.000 --> 0:21:53.960 So the Virginias in the North Carolinas and the Kentucky's 0:21:53.960 --> 0:21:56.199 and the Missouris of the world are not going to 0:21:56.240 --> 0:21:59.920 go along with this plan to equalize cigarette taxes because 0:22:00.000 --> 0:22:02.520 and did they know that means raising their great square 0:22:02.520 --> 0:22:06.800 a bit. Joel Bias is also skeptical about cigarette tax reform. 0:22:06.920 --> 0:22:13.280 We're also uh looking at a massively profitable industry that 0:22:13.440 --> 0:22:15.800 makes a lot of jobs, a lot of money, and 0:22:15.840 --> 0:22:19.520 a lot of tax receipts for local, state, and federal government. 0:22:19.960 --> 0:22:22.879 In other words, we can't expect either big tobacco or 0:22:22.960 --> 0:22:27.040 big government to change their stripes. But long term, says Hall, 0:22:27.640 --> 0:22:31.120 it won't matter. Fewer and fewer Americans is a proportion 0:22:31.160 --> 0:22:35.200 of the population eat your smoke. So it's this waning habit, 0:22:36.040 --> 0:22:40.720 and as it wanes, smuggling opportunities will continue to diminish. 0:22:40.760 --> 0:22:44.040 They won't go away, but they will diminish. The percentage 0:22:44.040 --> 0:22:46.400 of Americans who smoke is at an all time low, 0:22:46.840 --> 0:22:50.879 less than fift a half century ago. Before the Surgeon 0:22:50.920 --> 0:22:55.520 General's report, that number was closer to But tobacco is 0:22:55.560 --> 0:22:58.000 not the only harmful substance we have to worry about. 0:22:58.359 --> 0:23:00.520 It's not even the only one threatening ranks of the 0:23:00.600 --> 0:23:04.840 nation's military. Just as the Surgeon General once learned some 0:23:05.000 --> 0:23:08.960 disturbing truths about smoking, researchers today are learning some new 0:23:09.000 --> 0:23:17.880 ones about energy drinks. Back in Fayetteville, North Carolina, where 0:23:17.920 --> 0:23:21.919 authorities found our cigarette smugglers, there's another operation going on 0:23:22.080 --> 0:23:25.440 down the road at Fort Bragg. Just days after President 0:23:25.440 --> 0:23:28.439 Trump ordered the killing of Iron's top military leader, about 0:23:28.480 --> 0:23:31.440 thirty d U S Service members are now being deployed 0:23:31.480 --> 0:23:34.359 to the Middle East, and at times like these, volunteers 0:23:34.400 --> 0:23:37.680 and groups like the U s O spring into action. Well. Today, 0:23:37.840 --> 0:23:41.200 hundreds of community members came together to make care packages 0:23:41.280 --> 0:23:43.439 for military men and women. It's all part of a 0:23:43.480 --> 0:23:47.719 brigade created a care for those serving overseas. Donations are 0:23:47.760 --> 0:23:51.560 gathered and volunteers as symbol for packing parties. About four 0:23:51.720 --> 0:23:55.160 hundred people gathered in a church gym to bring donations, 0:23:55.240 --> 0:23:59.040 pack boxes, and write heartfelt letters. A wide variety of 0:23:59.080 --> 0:24:01.399 items can make it in of the packages, from trail 0:24:01.440 --> 0:24:05.199 mix and toothpaste to socks and sunblock. Another item you 0:24:05.240 --> 0:24:09.600 often see energy drinks. More than five cases of donated 0:24:09.720 --> 0:24:12.240 energy drinks were shipped off to troops in connection with 0:24:12.280 --> 0:24:16.400 the recent deployment from Fort Bragg. It's a well intentioned gesture, 0:24:16.640 --> 0:24:19.560 but it's one that can lead to some devastating consequences. 0:24:19.880 --> 0:24:23.240 We were doing this study with soldiers. This is Dr 0:24:23.280 --> 0:24:26.680 Amy Adler. She's a research psychologist with the Walter Reed 0:24:26.880 --> 0:24:30.520 Army Institute of Research, and we happened to have them 0:24:30.600 --> 0:24:35.840 in military classrooms, battalion classrooms, and they were sitting at 0:24:35.880 --> 0:24:39.040 their desks and as we were handing out our surveys, 0:24:39.040 --> 0:24:43.520 we noticed that at the top of almost every soldier's 0:24:43.640 --> 0:24:47.800 desk were energy drinks. And just looking out across all 0:24:47.840 --> 0:24:51.119