A New York state law cheap cigarettes discount banning sales of online cigarettes via the Internet is being challenged in federal court by Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp., which Monday said it had filed a lawsuit arguing that the new law unfairly limits the ways in which the company can do business marlboro cigarettes.

Mark Smith, director of public affairs at the Louisville, Ky.-based cigarette company, said the suit cheap cigarettes discount filed in U.S. District Court in Manhattan asks that the New York law be overturned. The measure is scheduled to go into effect in November and would also bar cigarette sales via mail order and the telephone dute free cigarettes.

But from the perspective of Brown & Williamson, the third-largest cigarettes maker in the U.S., the new law is unconstitutional. "The Constitution prohibits any one state from regulating avenues of commerce, such as the Internet, or U.S. mail, or interstate shipments," Smith said. The New York law "has implications for all e-commerce," he added cheap cigarettes discount.

The law, signed by Gov. George Pataki in August, would ban direct sales of cigarettes over the Internet and the two other mediums in an attempt to prevent minors from making illegal purchases, according to state officials. A spokesman for the governor's office couldn't be reached this morning for comment on Brown & Williamson's suit buy cigarettes.

Smith said Brown & Williamson last week set up a new division called BWT Direct LLC that plans to offer some of its harder-to-find cigarette brands directly to smokers. The direct-marketing strategy is aimed at making the brands more visible at a time when retailers have finite amounts of shelf space for products such as cigarettes dute free cigarettes.