From MSN Money, 05.24.2003:
'END OF CLASS-ACTIONS' FOR TOBACCO
David Adelman, a tobacco analyst at Morgan Stanley, said the ruling marked the end of tobacco class-action lawsuits.
"This is the best possible outcome for the industry and it fundamentally reduces its legal risk in a way very few things could," he said. "The albatross around the industry's neck has been removed. It signals the end of class actions."
Class-action suits expand sharply the number of plaintiffs and damages in a suit by allowing initial plaintiffs to sue on behalf of a larger group with common interests.
The 1994 lawsuit, the first smokers' legal action to be certified as a class action, was brought by six ailing smokers who claimed they were unable to stop smoking because they were addicted to nicotine. They claimed a host of illnesses ranging from sore throats to cancer and heart disease.
As I've said for years, if you didn't know nicotine was addictive after everything everyone's said or seen for the last 50 years or so, you've got to be so embarrassingly stupid that you should be ashamed to bring such a lawsuit.
Ok, granted, you were in it for the money, especially if you smoked and hadn't shown any signs of illness yet....
But it takes a unique kind of mentality [nay, morality] to stand up in public and pretend that: