Bill Would Make Smoking in Cars With Kids Illegal

A bill now headed to the state Senate floor would make it illegal to smoke inside a car that has a child 10 years old or younger inside. Sen. Darrell Jackson, D-Hopkins, is sponsoring the bill.

"I actually saw a person smoking in a car with a child in a restraint seat in the backseat, and I was horrified," he says. "We all know the danger of second-hand smoke and I think we have an obligation to protect the innocent. We're not trying to restrict where adults can smoke, but when it impacts an innocent life, like a child, then I think we have to step in."

The bill passed in the Senate Transportation Committee Wednesday.

Four other states and Puerto Rico already have similar laws. In California, it's illegal to smoke in a car if there's anyone under the age of 18 in the car. In Maine, the age is under 16. In Louisiana and Puerto Rico, the age limit is under 13, and in Arkansas there's no smoking with a child under the age of 6 in the car. Eighteen states besides South Carolina are considering the law this year, including Arkansas, which is debating whether to expand its current law to say no smoking with a child under 16 instead of 6.

Nicole Levy has a 9-year-old daughter and says she's ashamed to admit it, but she does sometimes smoke with her daughter in the car. Still, she supports Sen. Jackson's bill. "I think it's great. I shouldn't smoke in the car with my child," she says.

Fellow smoker Jason Jacobs says of the bill, "I think it's good, even though I do smoke. I don't have children of my own, but I wouldn't, no, if I had a child I wouldn't put 'em to that secondhand smoke and all that."

But the bill is facing opposition in the Senate from Sen. Mick Mulvaney, R-Lancaster. He thinks it's too much government intrusion into people's lives.

"Where does it stop? Smoking in a car with a child is a terrible idea, but is it the government's job to tell us that we can't do it? Not reading to your child is a terrible idea. Is that going to be against the law now? Are we going to mandate that parents read to their kids? Parents should do that, but it's not the government's job to tell them to do that. I feel the same way about this bill," he says. He's a non-smoker who hates cigarette smoke, but worries we're becoming too much of a "nanny state".

Sen. Jackson sponsored the same bill last year. It passed in the Senate but ran out of time in the House.

If the bill becomes law, the fine would be up to $100.