The tobacco industry knows that raising minimum age to 21 will hurt sales and worked to roll age back from 21 to 18

Dorie Apollonio and I just published “Minimum Ages of Legal Access for Tobacco in the United States From 1863 to 2015” in American Journal of Public Health.  I started work on this paper skeptical that Tobacco 21 was a good idea and ended up thinking it was an important policy to pursue.  (Given how hard the tobacco companies fought it here in California was another good indication that Tobacco 21 is a good idea.)
 
Here is the abstract:
 
In the United States, state laws establish a minimum age of legal access (MLA) for most tobacco products at 18 years. We reviewed the history of these laws with internal tobacco industry documents and newspaper archives from 1860 to 2014.
The laws appeared in the 1880s; by 1920, half of states had set MLAs of at least 21 years. After 1920, tobacco industry lobbying eroded them to between 16 and 18 years. By the 1980s, the tobacco industry viewed restoration of higher MLAs as a critical business threat. The industry’s political advocacy reflects its assessment that recruiting youth smokers is critical to its survival.
The increasing evidence on tobacco addiction suggests that restoring MLAs to 21 years would reduce  smoking initiation and prevalence, particularly among those younger than 18 years.
 
The full citation is:  New research:  The tobacco industry knows that raising minimum age to 21 wll hurt sales and worked to roll age back from 21 to 18Apollonio D, Glantz S.  Minimum Ages of Legal Access for Tobacco in the United States From 1863 to 2015.   Am J Public Health Published online ahead of print May 19, 2016: e1–e8. doi:10.2105/AJPH.2016.303172.  It is available here.