10:40 PM EDT on Thursday, September 2, 2004

Associated Press

RALEIGH, N.C. — Governor Mike Easley is urging North Carolina's congressional delegation to help ailing farmers with a buyout of the tobacco quota.

He says they should do it even if it means allowing the Food and Drug Administration to regulate cigarettes.

Easley says angering cigarette makers who oppose FDA regulation also shouldn't hold up the deal. Three cigarette makers — Reynolds American, Lorillard Tobacco and Liggett Group — are based in North Carolina.

The U.S. House passed a buyout bill without FDA regulation in June. The Senate later approved a bill that gives the FDA new authority. Efforts toward a compromise will probably be taken up once Congress returns from its summer recess next week.