Ending Lawsuit Abuse and Ensuring Litigation Fairness
A relatively small group of class and mass action trial lawyers are abusing our legal system. Their tactics often amount to nothing less than legalized extortion.
America's lawsuit system costs a quarter of a trillion dollars each year. Small businesses take a big hit, paying $98 billion in tort costs.
As a matter of principle, companies should be spending less money on litigation and more money on innovation. Health care providers should be spending less money in the court room and more money in operating and examining rooms. The single greatest disincentive for businesses to do business in America is the absurdity of our legal system. Indeed, we have become the lawsuit capital of the world.
Since its inception 10 years ago, the Chamber's Institute for Legal Reform (ILR) has spearheaded major improvements in the legal environment on the federal level and in the most legally abusive states and jurisdictions. ILR has exposed trial lawyers to public and legal scrutiny and has launched aggressive voter education campaigns in states where Supreme Court justices and attorneys general are elected. The composition of a number of these state courts has been fundamentally changed.
In 2008, ILR will spend more than $40 million to:
- Defend against trial lawyer-inspired attempts to expand liability for America's business community, including the criminalization of product liability law as well as attempts to limit the availability of federal preemption.
- Advance a comprehensive and commonsense solution to the problems of mass tort medical screenings and the asbestos litigation crisis.
- Build support for changes to the securities class action litigation system to increase America's global competitiveness.
- Fight to preserve the availability of arbitration and other reasonable alternatives to dispute resolution.
- Stop the export of abusive legal practices to other countries, thereby denying trial lawyers new venues in which to sue American companies.
- Encourage the adoption of the Attorneys General Code of Conduct, providing a consistent set of practices and policies on which the business community can rely in dealing with the states' chief legal officers.
- Continue educating the public about legal reform issues in key state judicial and attorney general races and enact legal reforms in problem states and jurisdictions.
In addition, the Chamber's public policy law firm, the National Chamber Litigation Center, will significantly expand its legal advocacy in the courts and in the regulatory agencies.
America must move away from a culture where everyone is a victim, and where any misfortune in life must always be someone else's fault. We must chart a course of responsible reform to restore vitality, fairness, and common sense to a justice system that once was, and can be again, a model for the world.
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