Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


1850s

Philip Morris, a London tobacconist, caters to English smokers who picked up smoking after trying French and Turkish cigarettes during the Crimean War.

1900s Buck Duke builds a trust

Buck Duke Pioneer botanist Luther Burbank captures the growing distress among scientists when he remarks that smoking is “nothing more or less than a slow, but sure, form of lingering suicide.”

American Tobacco Co. founder Buck Duke fields a small army of lawyers, lobbyists, and others who appeal to the pocketbooks of legislators being asked to crack downon cigarettes. Three members of the key Senate Finance Committee own tobacco stock, including its chairman, Nelson W. Aldrich of Rhode Island, who holds stockworth more than $1 million.

Four years later, when Congress passes the Pure Food and Drug Act, Sen. Aldrich and other federal lawmakers do Buck Duke’s bidding. Although no other ingested product is subject to heavier processing, more additives, or as many known or suspected toxins, tobacco is egregiously excluded from regulation. The industry will argue forever after that tobacco is neither a food nor a drug and thus properly exempted.

Fact:

Mother Jones was founded as a nonprofit in 1976 because we knew corporations and billionaires wouldn't fund the type of hard-hitting journalism we set out to do.

Today, reader support makes up about two-thirds of our budget, allows us to dig deep on stories that matter, and lets us keep our reporting free for everyone. If you value what you get from Mother Jones, please join us with a tax-deductible donation today so we can keep on doing the type of journalism 2022 demands.

payment methods

Fact:

Today, reader support makes up about two-thirds of our budget, allows us to dig deep on stories that matter, and lets us keep our reporting free for everyone. If you value what you get from Mother Jones, please join us with a tax-deductible donation today so we can keep on doing the type of journalism 2022 demands.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate