Government intrusion

Many health-conscious Americans are applauding a new Illinois law that bans smoking in public places starting next Jan. 1. They don't like to be around smokers because of the risks of second-hand smoke, the smell tobacco smoke leaves in their clothing and hair and the effect smoke has on their breathing. With a statewide ban, they will no longer have to rely on local ordinances to enjoy smoke-free restaurants and other public venues.

Equally onerous, however, is the growing intrusion of government into private lives and enterprise. Businesses that allow smoking do so at the risk of losing nonsmoking customers. And individuals who don't smoke and don't want to be around smokers can choose not to patronize establishments that permit smoking.

Government continues to assume a larger role in deciding for us how we should live our lives. In doing so, government is intruding further and further into the rights of private citizens. In a way, nanny government is no less offensive than those examples of eminent domain where government takes private property from unwilling sellers and hands it over to a developer.

State legislatures have recognized the inherent unfairness of government-sanctioned heavy-handedness in instances like unchecked eminent domain, but some of those same state legislatures are willing to impose blanket bans on all kinds on activities that are legal -- and, in the case of tobacco, generate large sums of money for state treasuries.

If government wants to regulate its own spaces -- government buildings and grounds -- fine. But when it extends its long arm of so-called protection to private enterprise, it encroaches further on the rights of business owners who can no longer decide how to run their own businesses. If government thinks smoking is wrong, ban tobacco.