Science, Statistics, and Senator Sam J. Ervin's Defense of the Cigarette
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23 Traces: Te UNC-Chapel Hill Journal of History Science, Statistics, and Senator Sam J. Ervin’s Defense of the Cigarette Samantha B. Bowen Industry On November 15, 1954, recently appointed North Car- olina Senator Sam Ervin Jr. delivered a speech at a Senate meeting convened to debate the censure of Senator Joseph R. McCarthy, where he ultimately convinced his colleagues to vote in favor of publicly condemning the Wisconsin fre- brand and his anti-Communist crusade. In the speech, Ervin recounted a story about an old lawyer advising his young protégé on how to settle a lawsuit. If both the law and the available evidence worked against a case, the old lawyer in- sisted, then the young man should “give somebody hell” and distract from “the weakness of your case.” Ervin accused Mc- Carthy of doing exactly that to delegitimize and undermine the group of senators tasked with investigating his conduct.1 Shortly thereafter, however, Ervin would follow McCarthy’s example by defending the tobacco industry when neither the evidence nor the law worked in his favor. During the 1950s, the mounting evidence regarding the articles harmful health efects of cigarette smoking began attracting media attention. Tis information fowed to the American public via magazine articles, newspaper stories, and radio broadcasts.2 By suggesting a causal relationship between smoking and cancer, these news stories increased public anxiety regarding the popular habit.3 In 1954, 90 percent of respondents to a public opinion poll revealed that they had read news stories linking smoking and cancer. Tat same year, for the frst time in American history, a lung cancer patient 1 Sam Ervin, “Congressional Record - Senate: Resolution of Censure,” Te Senator Sam J. Ervin, Jr. Library & Museum, Western Piedmont Community College, November 15, 1954, 1. 2 Allan Brandt, Te Cigarette Century (New York: Basic Books, 2007), 160. 3 James T. Patterson, Te Dread Disease: Cancer and Modern American Culture (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1987), 310. 24 Articles 25 Traces: Te UNC-Chapel Hill Journal of History fled a lawsuit against the tobacco companies for marketing “death-dealing products.”4 In rette industry. As tobacco went on trial, Ervin served as its chief counsel in Washington, 1959, approximately 44 percent of American men and 26 percent of American women fghting relentlessly to protect the interests of the industry and the people who benefted smoked.5 Given this climate, it is no surprise that public panic erupted fve years later from it. Facing the accusation that it was a “cancer stick” and a killer, tobacco was argu- when the United States government ofcially indicted cigarette smoking as being a cause ably the most difcult client the Harvard-educated and self-described “country lawyer” of lung cancer.6 ever had to defend. 11 No ofender that Ervin had ever represented was indicted with as On the front-page of the New York Times for Sunday, January 12, 1964, a large many murder charges and had as strong of a prosecution working against them as the black-and-white photograph showed Surgeon General Dr. Luther Terry speaking at a cigarette. press conference held the previous day. 7 Behind locked doors in an auditorium inside Yet, despite Ervin’s dedicated role as a guardian of the the State Department and with his Advisory Committee seated behind him, Dr. Terry golden leaf, scholarship on anti-tobacco legislation has tend- Surgeon General Luther Terry, who ap- spent 90 minutes reading a report peared on the front page of the New York ed to focus on 1960s anti-tobacco legislation rather than the that declared a history of smoking Times after he provided a lengthy report individuals who shaped or opposed it. With the exception of on smoking to the US State Department. increased the mortality rate of male (Photo courtesy of Wikimedia.) a single quotation, Ervin was completely omitted from Allan lung cancer patients by 1,000 per- Brandt’s Te Cigarette Century, the most comprehensive piece cent.8 Over the next few months, of scholarship on the topic. Biographies written about the the sales of these so-called “cofn senator primarily concentrate on his rejection of Civil Rights nails” fell by 15 to 20 percent and Congress began working to regulate the cigarette in- legislation and his leadership during the Senate Watergate Senator Sam J. Ervin, U.S. dustry, sparking a health scare that swept across the nation.9 Unsurprisingly, Americans Congressman from North Car- Hearings. An analysis of Ervin’s role in opposing anti-tobac- olina from 1954 to 1974. He with personal and fnancial interests in the tobacco industry perceived Terry’s fndings as co legislation flls this gap left open by previous scholarship. was a prominent player in late an attack. Te cigarette industry viewed the report and the anti-tobacco legislation that twentieth century debates over Te tobacco wars of the mid-to-late 1960s marked an im- tobacco legislation.(Photo cour- followed it as an act of aggression by the United States government. 10 With their most portant episode in Ervin’s senatorial career, and as a leader of tesy of the Library of Congress.) lucrative product condemned as a lethal carcinogen, members of the tobacco industry the opposition to these anti-smoking movements, Senator feared that, under the leadership of the Public Health Service, the US government would Ervin should be included in the wider narrative of this epi- destroy their businesses’ economic viability. Lobbyists, public ofcials from tobacco-pro- sode in American history.12 ducing states, and ordinary Americans began a mass movement to oppose this perceived Senator Ervin’s defense of the cigarette industry between 1964 and 1969 raises ques- violation of individual autonomy. tions about role of the United States government and how its altruistic endeavors can Senator Sam J. Ervin was one of the most prominent and steadfast opponents of encroach upon individual liberties.13 While Ervin argued that the civil liberties and con- anti-tobacco legislation. Ervin began challenging the validity of the Surgeon General’s stitutional rights of all individuals and organizations should be protected from govern- claims immediately after the release of the 1964 report on smoking and health. Trough- ment intervention at all costs, other legislators claimed that it was the government’s duty out the remainder of the decade, Ervin remained an unfinching defender of the ciga- to intervene in personal and commercial afairs when the well-being of the American people was at stake.14 Tis analysis also provides a case study for how the US government 4 Patterson, Te Dread Disease, 211. 5 E.C. Hammond and L. Garfnkel, “Changes in Cigarette Smoking 1959-1965,” American Journal of Public Health and the Nation’s Health 58, no. 1 (January 1968), https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1228038/?page=5. 11 Paul R. Clancy, Just a Country Lawyer (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1974), 5. 6 Walter Sullivan, “Cigarettes Peril Health, US Report Concludes; ‘Remedial Action Urged,’” New York Times, January 12, 1964, 1. 12 Brandt, Te Cigarette Century; Clancy, Just a Country Lawyer; Karl E. Campbell, Senator Sam Ervin, Last of the Founding Fathers 7 Ibid. (Chapel Hill: Te University of North Carolina Press, 2007); Dick Dabney, A Good Man: Te Life of Sam J. Ervin (Boston: Houghton 8 A. Lee Fritschler, Smoking and Politics (New York: Meredith Corporation, 1969), 44; Sullivan, “Cigarettes Peril Health,” NYT, 1. Mifin Company, 1976). 9 Brandt, Te Cigarette Century, 54-55, 237, 243. 13 Campbell, Senator Sam Ervin, Last of the Founding Fathers, 9. 10 Ibid., 250. 14 James K. Batten, “Sam Ervin Speaks His Piece in Defense of Tobacco,” Des Moines Tribune, December 7, 1967, Sam J. Ervin Papers, #03847B-702, Te Southern Historical Collection, Te Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. 26 Articles 27 Traces: Te UNC-Chapel Hill Journal of History responded to new scientifc research and investigates the necessity of concrete evidence 300,000 people with stock invested in the industry’s $3 billion in assets. Furthermore, the for regulation. Such questions are still relevant today. As researchers make new discover- tobacco industry was an integral part of the American commercial and industrial econo- ies and develop new technologies, politics and science will continue to clash. Politicians mies. Approximately 1.5 million US businesses were involved with the tobacco industry continue to condemn statistical evidence and like Ervin, cry that “fgures lie and liars in some way, either by supplying the materials and equipment needed to produce and fgure.”15 However, these individuals may have political interests that render them just as manufacture tobacco products or by distributing and merchandising these products.20 biased as the statistics they are trying to disprove. No other American state, however, was as economically dependent upon the tobacco ‘Tobacco Sam’ and the Tobacco State industry as North Carolina. In 1964, tobacco was the “bedrock” of the state’s economy.21 Tobacco has long been synonymous with prosperity in North America. Before and From feld to factory, North Carolinians were involved in every stage of cigarette produc- after the arrival of Europeans, Native Amer- tion. Sixty-one percent of all cigarettes manufactured in the United States were made in 22 ican tribes and nations traded tobacco for the Old North State. Approximately 165,000 farm families in 86 of North Carolina’s 23 other goods and smoked the plant in dip- 100 counties raised tobacco. In an interview with the New York Times, Governor Terry lomatic ceremonies.16 John Rolfe’s ability Sanford stated that revenue from the leaf generated nearly half of the state’s farm cash 24 to cultivate and turn a proft from the leaf receipts in the early 1960s.