One of the unanticipated effects of the 2008 Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act is that you won’t be able to buy children’s books published before 1985. Among those lamenting that fact are the Atlantic’s Megan McArdle, overlawyereed.com’s Walter Olson and radio talk show host/Orange County lawyer Hugh Hewitt. Olson and Hewitt have been all over this story.
How did Congress come to ban pre-1985 children’s books? Well, it’s simple. The CPSIA banned all products aimed at children under 12 which contain even trace amounts of lead. Children’s books printed before 1978. Books printed before 1985 may have been printed with lead in their pigments.
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