AUGUSTA – Members of the Maine House concluded Monday that it’s time to end the practice of using adolescents as undercover agents in Maine’s tobacco sting operations.

The future of the 7-year-old program that uses juveniles to bust store clerks for selling tobacco products to underage customers unexpectedly was thrust into doubt after a successful floor speech in the House by Rep. Paul Waterhouse, R-Bridgton. As sponsor of the bill prohibiting juveniles from participating in tobacco stings, Waterhouse declared it was “morally wrong” to use children to break the law in order to convict law-breaking store clerks.

Waterhouse managed to convince House members the program was worth dumping – even if it meant forfeiting a $2.5 million federal grant for substance abuse prevention.

“If we have to lose our money by doing this, let’s lose it,” Waterhouse said. “If I had $2 million in my pocket, and that’s all I had, I’d send it to the federal government to get rid of this policy.”

Although the Legislature’s Health and Human Services Committee voted 9-4 against LD 14 earlier this year, the House ignored that recommendation Monday and instead gave the Waterhouse bill a lopsided 98-41 endorsement. The bill faces additional votes in the Senate where it is expected to face significant opposition. But then, LD 14 was not expected to pick up the depth of support it received in the House.

Rep. Thomas J. Kane, D-Saco, took the lead among the minority of speakers who opposed the bill. As House chairman of the Health and Human Services Committee, Kane argued that using juveniles was a strategically important part of enforcing tobacco laws and a practice recommended by the Centers for Disease Control. Federal funds, he said, also could be on the line if the state rejected the program, which is administered and endorsed by the Maine Attorney General’s Office.

“If this bill passes, we risk the loss of $2.5 million in federal substance abuse funding,” Kane said. “This would lead to the elimination of all community prevention and treatment programs in our community. These are funds that are granted by the Department of Human Services and administered by our Department of Mental Health.”

Kane also emphasized that Maine has the highest percentage of teen smoking in the United States, and said that statistic should dominate thinking on the issue. The juvenile participation program, he said, has been extremely successful and has not put those who agree to buy cigarettes illegally at personal risk.

But Waterhouse argued that the program exploits and manipulates juveniles and sends the wrong message by making it “OK to break the law” as long as the ends justify the means.

“This is using our children for squealing in state prosecution,” he said. “The training of young people as bait for catching merchants during sting operations carries with it a strong odor of youth education and youth heroism that is Stalinist in spirit. … What’s next? If this seems to be successful as some proponents say it is, do we get kids to do hard-core drug sting operations?”

Waterhouse’s characterization of the program as “unsavory” was echoed immediately by Rep. James G. Skoglund of St. George, one of many Democrats who voted for the bill. A retired teacher, Skoglund maintained it was wrong to use young people as “secret police” to deliberately set up people who are law-abiding citizens. It sends a message, he said, that leads children to believe one cannot expect the government to be 100 percent truthful if it seeks to entrap its own citizens.

“I was brought up to believe that it was wicked to tempt people into doing evil,” Skoglund said. “And if it’s wicked for an individual to entice someone else to do evil, why isn’t it even more wicked for a government agency to set up people to commit crimes?”

A last-ditch attempt by Kane to convince his seatmates that the program is protecting thousands of youngsters from becoming hooked on cigarettes went nowhere and quickly became lost in some ensuing rhetoric from Rep. Lois Snowe-Mello, R-Poland.

“I don’t want kids doing undercover jobs,” she said. “Doing this kind of operation is similar to what Hitler did with the youths in Germany when he turned the children to spy on their parents. Also, in Afghanistan children are used as spies to work for the communist party.”

A former store owner, Rep. Joe Perry, D-Bangor, said the program probably had outlived its usefulness, pointing out that most store clerks can easily spot undercover customers and are notified immediately through a grapevine of other store owners the minute a sting operation hits town.

“I see kids everywhere obviously underage smoking cigarettes,” he said. “Why not bust the kid and hit them in the pocketbook and then maybe ask them where they bought the cigarettes and take them back and set them up where the problem is? This program’s not working anymore; it’s time to move on.”

The debate even managed to inspire one of the two nonvoting House members to rise and address her seatmates. Rep. Donna M. Loring of Richmond, one of the Legislature’s two tribal representatives, said the Penobscot Nation teaches its children that elders should be respected – not entrapped.

“There is something inherently wrong with using your children in such a manner,” she said. “I cannot fathom a tribal council ever deliberating such a program for their children. And I tell you that, if I could vote, I would vote against this and with Rep. Waterhouse.”