First, restaurants, bars, etc., that are owned by specific individuals are not public resources but rather private venues and should be, justifiably, subject to the control of their rightful owners. Therefore, if they wish to allow smoking on their premises they should be allowed to do so. Any attempt to prevent them from doing so is, in essence, a massive violation of their property rights and should not be allowed.

Second, cigarettes are not killers. They are inanimate objects. They do not act, they are the objects of human actions; they are therefore under the volitional control of their users. It is true that human beings develop habits which may ultimately bring harm upon themselves, but they are ultimately in control of their habits and can adjust their behavior according to their values.

To speak of one's addiction having control over one s actions is, I believe, somewhat misguided; human beings can determine their own actions, including the habitual action which they undertake. Similarly, they can choose as I and many other have done in the past, to alter or completely terminate negative habits.

Contrary to popular mythology, our ideas and subsequent actions are not determined by factors (including nicotine) beyond our volitional control.

Thirdly, some may argue, with some emotional force, that our elected pubic officials have some responsibility to act in our best interest. But do we really elect other human beings to act in our best interest? Isn,t the function of electing individuals to public office to protect our rights and therefore, to secure an environment such that each one of us can actualize his or her values in the form of actions which he or she deems to be in her own best interests?

This is the key point. It is each individual who has to act and therefore, each individual who has to determine their own interests to which he or she should direct his or her actions. This of course, requires individual liberty, the antitheses of the "elected public officials have some responsibility to act in our best interest" argument.

Surely, if we are so incapable of making proper choices in respect to our own lives, how could we possibly have the ability to elect public officials to oversee those very same lives?

Remember the ability to elect such people would require the intelligence and insight which we allegedly lack in the first place and which, therefore, justifies the coercive intervention of the elected officials, obviously, a hopeless circular and absurd argument. The vision which I believe our society should pursue is one in which the state protects our person and property rights instead of utilizing its legal monopoly over the use of coercion in a vain attempt to mold us into virtuous citizens.

Concomitant and integral to that basic vision is the belief that those among us who are well-resourced and powerful, such as the anti-smoking sect, will use their resources in an attempt to reason, as opposed to force, the smoking public into a more physically healthy position.

(Letter to the Editor, Coquitlam NOW,11 June 1997)

Carr claims that people who oppose Coquitlam's terrible anti-smoking bylaw favour a "me" attitude in which individuals feel they can act in their own interest regardless of how it affects others. False. I don't recall any smokers' rights advocate ever asking for permission to smoke on Carr's property.

Rather, owners of private restaurants and businesses are asking for permission to decide for themselves whether they will allow smokers on their own property.

It is Carr and his ilk that are showing disrespect for other people's choices when they want to use the power of government to prevent people from making their own choices with their own property. I am very worried about the self righteousness of so many busybodies in Canada, who instead of respecting other people by trying to use persuasion to change their habits they don't like, think it is perfectly fine to use government coercion to force others to do what they want.

So please, B. Carr, I promise not to smoke on your property if you allow me the equal, opposite right to get together with my friends on someone else's property (a restaurant) to smoke to my heart's content if the owner allows us.

I won't disrespect your choice and I hope you won't disrespect mine.

(Coquitlam NOW, 9 July 1997)

Reprinted with permission from WEST COAST LIBERTARIAN, 922 Cloverley St., North Vancouver, B.C. V7L 1N3 (annual subscription $20.)