336 



Mr. Waxman. Before I call on our next colleague, I want to indi- 

 cate to Mr. Bliley that the documents that will be referred to today 

 are not documents that Brown & Williamson has argued about. We 

 have shared documents that we received from the tobacco industry 

 as quickly as we have been able to share them with the Minority. 

 The staff report which was produced today was shared in advance 

 with the Minority. We will continue to attempt to be as cooperative 

 as possible with you and your staff so that we can have a full and 

 fair hearing. 



Mr. Synar. 



Mr. Synar. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 



The Council for Tobacco Research has spent the past 3 decades 

 bullying scientists into reporting that cigarettes are less cancer 

 causing than private and government-funded subsidies have found. 



The Council for Tobacco Research has refused to publish studies 

 that the tobacco companies did not approve and the CTR has struc- 

 tured itself so that all research results are protected by attorney- 

 client privilege. 



The purpose of attorney-client privilege is not to allow attorneys 

 to aid and abet tobacco companies' fraud on the American people. 

 Attorney-client privilege does not protect attorneys who squelch 

 findings of cigarettes causing cancer in rats nor does it protect at- 

 torneys who falsely deny the health hazards of smoking to Con- 

 gress. 



We need to be asking ourselves, "Are the attorneys employed by 

 the tobacco companies functioning as counsel or as tobacco com- 

 pany executives?" Does the attorney-client privilege extend to deci- 

 sions made by the CTR and tobacco company attorneys to fund or 

 not to fund a project or to withhold study results? 



I hope we are able to learn more today about the practices of the 

 Council for Tobacco Research, and I look forward to further inquir- 

 ies into the approaches used by the tobacco industry attorneys in 

 shielding their clients' conduct from public scrutiny for over 30 

 years. 



Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 



[The opening statement of Mr. Synar follows:] 



Statement of Hon. Mike Synar 



Ladies and gentlemen, the subcommittee is holding this hearing to shed some 

 light on the activities of the Council on Tobacco Research (CTR) over the past 40 

 years. The country's largest cigarette companies set up CTR in 1954 to provide the 

 American people with what was supposed to be objective scientific evidence of the 

 effects of smoking on one's health. 



We know today that CTR has spent the past 3 decades bullying scientists into 

 reporting that cigarettes are less cancer-causing than reported by privately- and 

 government-funded studies. We also know that CTR has refused to publish studies 

 that were not to the liking of tobacco companies, and that CTR structured itself so 

 that all research results would be protected by attorney-client privilege. These ac- 

 tivities are detailed in the February 11, 1993, Wall Street Journal article that I 

 have attached to this statement. [See p. 97]. 



Attorney-client privilege is intended to encourage a client to fully disclose his or 

 her activities to an attorney, so that the attorney can provide the client with com- 

 petent representation. It is not the same as the privilege which ejcists between a 

 clergyperson and parishioner or a doctor and patient. Those are relationships of con- 

 science or health. An attorney is there to defend a client in court. 



The purpose of the attorney-client privilege is not to allow attorneys to aid and 

 abet tobacco companies' fraud upon the American people. Attorney-client privilege 

 does not protect attorneys who squelch CTF's findings of cigarettes causing cancer 



