NPM Adjustment Arbitration (State of Kansas), Tobacco Master Settlement Agreement
Wagstaff & Cartmell was honored to represent the State of Kansas as outside counsel in a multi-year, complex arbitration over a contract dispute arising from the Master Settlement Agreement reached in 1998, helping the State preserve more than $450 million in future payments under the Settlement Agreement.
About The Case
In 1998, the major tobacco companies reached a $206 billion global settlement with 48 states memorialized in the landmark Master Settlement Agreement (MSA). In 2008, the tobacco companies initiated an arbitration proceeding against 35 states under a provision in the MSA contending that they were entitled to a $1.1 billion adjustment to their contract payments for the year 2003. The Kansas Attorney General held a multi-step interview process and selected Wagstaff & Cartmell to serve as private counsel for Kansas in the arbitration proceeding. Wagstaff & Cartmell prepared and presented Kansas’s case to a panel of three former federal judges at an arbitration hearing in Chicago. The tobacco companies were represented by three well-known national law firms. After the hearing but before the Panel’s decision, Kansas settled all disputes with the tobacco companies for years 2003-12, which preserved for Kansas more than $450 million of contract payments from the tobacco companies.