The MSA only resolved state and local government lawsuits; the tobacco industry did not gain protection from class action lawsuits and claims brought by individuals, labor unions, private healthcare insurers, and the United States government. The Federal Government’s Lawsuit During the same time that the states were engaged in negotiating the terms of the MSA, the federal government was engaged in an effort to legislate, rather than litigate. The effort was led by Senator John McCain, and the proposed legislation had bipartisan support. The proposed legislation would have raised the price of a pack of cigarettes by $1.10 and allowed the government to regulate tobacco advertising, and it imposed penalties on the industry if smoking by underage teenagers did not decline sharply. The tobacco industry lobbied hard for inclusion of a provision in the legislation that would grant them immunity from certain personal injury lawsuits; however, that did not become part of the bill. As a result, the legislation was not supported by the industry, and the bill failed to pass. On January 19, 1999, President Bill Clinton announced in his State of the Union address that the Justice Department was preparing a litigation plan to take tobacco companies to court and to use the funds recovered from litigation to strengthen Medicare. The Justice Department formed a small team of lawyers to work exclusively on the matter and try to develop the case, and eight months later, on September 22, 1999, the U.S. Justice Department filed a civil lawsuit 3 in the United States District Court for the District of Columbia against the major tobacco companies—nine cigarette manufacturers—and two tobacco-related trade organizations. The lawsuit alleged that the companies’ actions violated three statutes, including the Medicare Reimbursement Act (“MCRA”), the Medicare Secondary Payor provisions of the Social Security Act (“MSP”), and the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (“RICO”) Act. In September 2000, the court dismissed the MCRA and MSP causes of action and permitted the government to proceed with its RICO case as pled. (The RICO statute had been used extensively by the United States to prosecute cases involving organized crime). In its complaint, the government alleged that defendants violated and continued to violate RICO by engaging in a lengthy unlawful conspiracy to deceive the American public about the health effects of smoking and second-hand smoke, the addictiveness of nicotine, the health benefits from low tar and “light” cigarettes, and their manipulation of the design and composition of cigarettes in order to sustain nicotine addiction. As Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor noted in Food and Drug Administration, et al. v. Brown and Williamson Tobacco Corp., et al., 529 U.S. 120, 125 (2000), “[t]his case involves one of the most troubling public health problems facing our Nation today: the thousands of premature deaths that occur each year because of tobacco use.” 3 On the same day that the civil litigation was filed, the Justice Department closed, without issuing any indictments, its criminal investigation of the tobacco industry. The evidence collected in connection with that Justice Department investigation was not available to the lawyers pursuing the civil case, under the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure. 4