Legal Strategies to Manage Obesity and Increase Physical
Activity Edward P. Richards Louisiana State University, Baton
Rouge - Paul M. Hebert Law Center July 31, 2011 Louisiana State
University Program in Law, Science, and Public Health Working
Paper No. 100 Protecting the public's health and safety is a
core function of government. The governments of the original
colonies enforced public health laws before the American
Revolution and their powers were retained by the states when the
Constitution was ratified. In 1850, the first demographic study
of deaths in the United States, the Report of the Sanitary
Commission of Massachusetts (the Shattuck Report), found that
the average life expectancy in the United States was between 25
and 35 years. The major cause of mortality was infectious
disease spread through inadequate sanitation. The Report led to
a model public health law that formed the basis of a national
sanitation movement. Over the next 100 years, life expectancy
more than doubled. The sanitation moveme