Smoking: The Butt Stops Here

On a bright, brisk spring afternoon last week, Bill Clinton threw out the first ball at the Cleveland Indians' opening-day game. But his pitch, high and over the plate, was more than the usual springtime rite. The President helped kick off the baseball season in Jacobs Field, a sleek, brand-new, $169 million stadium, a large chunk of which was financed by a 4.5 cents-a-pack local tax on cigarettes. Yet no one, no matter where they are sitting, is permitted to smoke in the open-air stands.

For antismoking activists in the U.S., the game these days is hardball.

For years, smokers and...