Canada’s Supreme Court will rule this Thursday on the constitutionality of federal restrictions on tobacco advertising.

The court will also return a verdict on the government's requirements that prominent and graphic health warnings be put on cigarette packages.
As early as 1995 the Supreme Court had rejected a total ban on tobacco on the grounds that it violated free speech. The 1995 decision did allow partial bans, including a prohibition on ads aimed at children and said the government could require health warnings as long as they were properly attributed. The government then introduced new restrictions and required depictions of rotten gums, sexual impotence and other tobacco-induced afflictions on cigarette packages. However, Canada's three main tobacco companies argued that the new rules were too vague and that it would still violate their freedom of expression.