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"Tort
reform" is a scheme to protect rich corporations from
the consequences of wrongdoing. Those such as we who’d
prefer that the wealthy be called to account for their sins
are accused of "bashing the rich" and "waging
class warfare." Generally speaking, the corporate media
do not allow criticism of those who possess great wealth,
corporate or individual.
There is one striking exception to this rule, and that is
trial lawyers. Right-wing pundits are furious that John
Edwards and people like him have made money practicing law.
Why, they ask, shouldn’t these troublesome plaintiffs’
attorneys have to get out and
hustle for their bread, the way that corporations do —
making automobiles that blow up when bumped, or selling
cancer-inducing tobacco products, or bilking the public,
their shareholders and even their own employees while
jiggering the energy market.
When a
corporate lawyer from New York came to Little Rock to debate
tort reform, his opponent, trial lawyer Chip Welch,
carefully pointed out the man’s many corporate clients,
including tobacco companies, Enron and Newsweek, which
devotes whole issues to promoting tort reform and quotes its
own lawyer as the chief expert on the subject. Welch ate the
guy up, incidentally, and it’s said the New Yorker was
unhappy with his hosts for not scheduling a weaker opponent.
Maybe
he’ll sue them. Contrary to the propaganda about trial
lawyers causing a landslide of lawsuits, it is corporate
lawyers who file most of the lawsuits, and they file them
against other corporations. President Bush said last week
that "frivolous lawsuits" and "trial
lawyers" were a threat to the economy, because they
burden American businesses. But a report by the nonpartisan
group Public Citizen shows that "American businesses
file four times as many lawsuits as do individuals
represented by trial attorneys, and they are penalized by
judges much more often for pursuing frivolous
litigation." A Public Citizen survey in parts of four
states found that businesses were 3.3 to 5.8 times more
likely to file lawsuits than were individuals. The findings
are particularly enlightening at a time when businesses
(including corporate-owned newspapers and TV networks),
politicians and medical doctors are campaigning to limit
ordinary citizens’ rights to sue over everything from
medical malpractice to defective products. Public Citizen
notes: "By way of comparison, the number of American
consumers (281million) outnumbers the number of businesses
in America (7 million) by 40 times."
Clearly,
it’s these business lawsuits that that are clogging up the
courts, burdening the economy, and creating a fair number of
rich lawyers too. Contract reform is what we need. Millions
of dollars, maybe billions, could be put to productive use
if it weren’t squandered on promiscuous suing. New and
cheaper drugs might be discovered. Companies might even be
able to bring back some of the jobs they’ve shipped off to
Asia and Latin America. |