Walgreens seeks injunction to stop S.F. tobacco ban

The San Francisco Chronicle reports:

Attorneys representing Walgreens today alerted the city they will be seeking an emergency injunction to stop the city's plan to prohibit the sale of tobacco products in pharmacies.

In July, San Francisco became the first city in the nation to ban the sale of tobacco products in pharmacies such as Walgreens and Rite-Aid. The ban doesn't affect the sale of cigarettes in grocery stores or big-box stores that also have pharmacies.

Attorneys for Walgreens will be in Superior Court on Tuesday to get a hearing on their request for an emergency injunction to block the ban, which is set to take effect Oct. 1. They are arguing the ban is discriminatory because it doesn't cover other types of stores.

Mitch Katz, director of the city's Department of Public Health, called the move "outrageous."

"It's one thing to say you're doing it for the convenience of your customers, but to actually sue? To say this is your right to sell the substance associated with the No. 1 cause of preventable death?" he said. "It's unbelievable to me."

Here's is the authoritarian personality at work.The big government people in San Francisco don't think you have a right to basic constitutional principle such as equal protection under the law.Just because a majority wants to do something in San Francisco doesn't make it right.