John Van de Kamp

John Van de Kamp served as the District Attorney for the County of Los Angeles from 1976 until 1982, and then as 28th California Attorney General from 1982 until 1991.

Recently, Van de Kamp was elected the 80th president of the State Bar of California for 2004-2005. He currently serves as president of the board of directors for the Planning and Conservation League.

Van de Kamp and tobacco issues
In response to tobacco industry-motivated opposition to Proposition 99 (a cigarette tax proposed in 1988) and advertisements that claimed an increased tax would stimulate smuggling, California Attorney General John Van de Kamp released a report based on state and federal government data that showed cigarette smuggling was negligible even in states with high tobacco taxes. Van de Kamp criticized the advertisements (run by a group called Californians Against Unfair Tax Increases), calling them "a scare tactic of the worst and baldest kind [and] utter nonsense, fabricated by people who represent the tobacco industry."

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