An Outline for Model Legislation

Prohibit giving, selling or distributing cigarettes or other tobacco products to any person under 21 years of age. Provide for signage relating to age 21 and control vending machine sales. (Note: signage and vending machine language is a minimum taken as example only from Ohio code.)

A) No manufacturer, producer, distributor, wholesaler, or retailer of cigarettes or other tobacco products, or any agent, employee, or representative of a manufacturer, producer, distributor, wholesaler, or retailer of cigarettes or other tobacco products shall do any of the following:

(1) Give, sell, or otherwise distribute cigarettes or other tobacco products to any person under twenty-one years of age;
(2) Give away, sell, or distribute cigarettes or other tobacco products in any place that does not have posted in a conspicuous place a sign stating that giving, selling, or otherwise distributing cigarettes or other tobacco products to a person under twenty-one years of age is prohibited by law.

(B) No person shall sell or offer to sell cigarettes or other tobacco products by or from a vending machine except in the following locations:

(1) An area either: (a) Within a factory, business, office, or other place not open to the general public; or b) To which persons under the age of twenty-one are not generally permitted access;

(2) In any other place not identified in division (B)(1) of this section, upon all of the following conditions:(a) The vending machine is located within the immediate vicinity, plain view, and control of the person who owns or operates the place, or an employee of such person, so that all cigarettes and other tobacco product purchases from the vending machine will be readily observed by the person who owns or operates the place or an employee of such person. For the purpose of this section, a vending machine located in any unmonitored area, including an unmonitored coatroom, restroom, hallway, or outer waiting area, shall not be considered located within the immediate vicinity, plain view, and control of the person who owns or operates the place, or an employee of such person. (b) The vending machine is inaccessible to the public when the place is closed.