In 1976, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) became the home for the National Clearinghouse for Smoking and Health. This would eventually become the Office on Smoking and Health.

The fight for tobacco control ordinances originally began at the grassroots level, even before the scientific evidence of the harms of secondhand smoke emerged. As early as the 1970s, lawmakers began to look to CDC to provide that evidence to support legal restrictions and bans on smoking.