Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, March 1, 1995 TAG: 9503010029
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-9 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: GEORGE McGOVERN
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
This, I thought, was a reasonable and fairly obvious observation - neither left nor Newt-right - upon which people of good will and even differing views could come to a meeting of the minds. Not so, I discovered.
My friend Ralph Nader asked, ``How could George McGovern perform a 'Quayle' on the issue of civil justice?" A respected liberal columnist said I had ``defected'' and abandoned my ``traditional liberal allies." This, even after House Speaker Newt Gingrich, when trying to say the most destructive thing he could say about President and Mrs. Clinton, referred to them as ``a couple of counterculture McGovern-niks!"
It is a wonderful comment on our times that liberal George McGovern finds himself at Ground Zero in the middle of the debate. The truth is I have not, and could never, leave my liberal friends and allies. But I have left some of the trial lawyers, those who, because of their greed, stand in the way of placing some reasonable curbs on the burgeoning American lawsuit industry.
I learned this the hard way after I left the Senate and decided to open a country inn in Stratford, Conn. We had a great manager and a great inn until the twin curses of all small business - excessive government regulation and litigation - contributed substantially to our demise.
Two lawsuits filed against our inn have stuck in my mind. The first involved a man who got into a fight in our parking lot, fell and was injured. We had a security man on duty, having made adequate provision for a safe environment. However, we did not have the U.S. Marine Corps out there in the parking lot. We finally won the suit, but only after the expenditure of a great deal of time, effort and money.
The second incident, a few weeks later, involved a lady who was leaving the hotel and tripped, for some reason still unknown to me, fell and injured her hip. Another lawsuit. Again, it was finally won by my lawyers, but it was an expensive and time-consuming incident that set back the business considerably.
We have a great civil-justice system in the United States. No one wants to undercut that. Legitimate claimants should have their day. But if we are to preserve that system against some of the abuses that have crept in, we must overhaul the system in fundamental ways. Congressional efforts to enact reform at the federal level are an important first step.
First, we must put a stop to the frivolous and fraudulent lawsuit. It has been estimated at a meeting of the American Board of Trial Advocates that a fourth of all the lawsuits filed in the United States are either frivolous or fraudulent. Another study by Harvard University on medical injury and malpractice litigation found that 80 percent of the participants in those suits suffered no real injury as a result of medical negligence. Attorney sanctions should be strengthened to keep frivolous or fraudulent cases out of court.
Second, we should look for some meaningful standards to determine whether punitive damages should be awarded and, if so, in what amounts. It makes sense for courts to be allowed to assess punitive damages to punish egregious and intentional corporate misconduct. What makes no sense is the outlandish ``lottery'' system that makes it possible for a lady who spills hot coffee from McDonald's in her lap to receive a multimillion-dollar award.
What message does this send individuals who must assume some personal responsibility for their own conduct? The Supreme Court has just agreed to review the award of $2 million to a man who bought a car without being told its paint had been retouched. How much is too much? How much of these lottery awards are a kind of greed-tax we all pay?
Finally, we must stop enterprising personal-injury lawyers from reaching for every ``deep pocket'' they can find in search of a million-dollar settlement - no matter who is really at fault for an injury. Taxpayers pay dearly for this.
The New York Daily News called New York City ``Sue City,'' as the city's total payout in personal-injury actions has exploded from $24 million in 1977 to some $260 million in 1994! New Yorkers have been shocked to see a subway mugger who preyed on the elderly become a multimillionaire thanks to a Manhattan jury that awarded him $4.3 million for being shot as he fled from the scene of a crime.
Who was at fault here? Certainly not the taxpayers of New York who can be held wholly responsible for an injury award when the plaintiff is at least partially at fault under the doctrine of joint and several liability.
Supporting curbs on the American lawsuit industry is not about being conservative or liberal. It is not about being a good Democrat or a loyal Republican. It is about being reasonable and responsible. There was a time not so many years ago when a lawsuit for damages was literally a court of last resort. We have to stop seeing each other as plaintiffs and defendants, as possible targets for every accident that happens.
I try to learn something from all of my life experiences, pleasant and unpleasant. What I learned from my two lawsuits is that as a nation, unless we move now to reform our system of civil justice, we stand to undercut the civil basis of society itself.
The lawyers may get richer, but the rest of us will surely be the poorer for it.
George McGovern is a former U.S. senator and was the 1972 Democratic presidential nominee.
by CNB