by Sharon Lerner

About the author: Sharon Lerner is a New York City–based freelance writer and editor. She frequently writes on health care issues.

Seventy-five years ago, a woman ran for president of the United States on an antismoking platform. Lucy Page Gaston, who ran against known smoker Warren

G. Harding, thought that smoking led to drinking, a life of crime, and a condition she called “cigarette face.” She objected particularly to smoking by minors and women and, with the support of a substantial turn-of-the-century antismoking movement, she helped restrict smoking in more than 20 states by the mid-1920s. At the time, women accounted for an estimated 5 percent of all tobacco consumers. We’ve come a long way since then, of course. Women now make up nearly half of all...