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DÉJÀ VU ALL OVER AGAIN: BUSH
AND TORT REFORM
GWB's Harshest Texas Legacy May Be The
Nation's Problem Now
Joanne
Doroshow is Executive Director of the
Center for Justice & Democracy.
When Governor George W. Bush
took office in 1995, one of his first acts was
to meet with nine corporate groups in a salsa
factory outside of Austin, after which Bush
declared a legislative "emergency"
on "frivolous lawsuits."
Bush went on to sign a series of laws that
insulate Texas corporations from lawsuits for
their reckless behavior and strip the rights
of injured Texans who would be entitled to
compensation. These "tort reform"
measures included: capping the damages that
big corporations must pay when they injure or
kill (e.g., Ford/Firestone); diluting Texas's
Deceptive Trade Practices Act to benefit,
among others, used car salesmen and
real-estate developers; making it more
difficult for the sick and injured to sue
malpracticing doctors; immunizing teachers
from liability for hitting children; and
prohibiting Texas cities from suing gun makers
and sellers.
According to Dan Lambe of the consumer group
TexasWatch, these laws "set back
hard-fought consumer protection victories by
decades, making it more difficult for injured
workers and Texas families to hold
irresponsible wrongdoers accountable."
Thanks to Bush’s record in Texas, "tort
reform" emerged as an
"under-the-radar" presidential
campaign issue that Fort Worth Telegram
columnist Molly Ivins cynically dubbed his
"sole legitimate claim to be a 'reformer
with results.'" Now that he's going to be
president, we might ask what Bush’s Texas
record portends for all Americans.
So Much For States' Rights
First, it should not necessarily mean
anything. Bush, after all, campaigned hard on
an anti-Washington, states’ rights platform
and there has hardly been an area more
traditionally reserved to the states than
liability law, or tort, in lawyerspeak.
Unfortunately, as the U.S. Supreme Court
decision anointing Bush president clarified
for most Americans, hypocrisy doesn't seem to
thwart partisan Republicans from interfering
with state authority when it suits their
agenda.
And it certainly hasn't stopped Bush. In
February 2000, he released a "tort
reform" package containing several
measures aimed at penalizing injured consumers
and their attorneys, and taking authority away
from local judges and juries. During the
presidential debates, he expressed specific
support for a federal law immunizing teachers
who hit their students.
With Congress now split and Senate Democrats
likely to stop any radical new legislation,
tinkering with bills from Congress's last
session might be as far as Bush can go, at
least early on. A controversial class action
bill will undoubtedly earn Bush's support when
it resurfaces again. This law would make it
more difficult for consumers to succeed in
class action lawsuits against corporations
that commit fraud and other violations of
consumer health, safety, and environmental
laws.
There's also the Patients Bill of Rights,
which would, among other things, allow
consumers to sue HMOs for malpractice. This
incredibly popular idea doesn't sound like
something Bush would go for, except that
during the campaign, he had the gall to take
credit for enacting a similar law in Texas. In
fact, as governor Bush actually vetoed the
bill once and then let it become law without
his signature when a veto-proof majority
passed it again.
While a Patients Bill of Rights sounds like a
great idea, Bush and the Republicans also have
a special fondness for "capping
damages," especially punitive damages
that hold corporations accountable for their
most severe misconduct. Unfortunately for
consumers, these "states rights"
advocates are likely to support such a cap on
HMO liability, allowing the cash-greased
Congress to overrule the judgments of local
judges and juries in cases where bad HMO
decisions have egregious outcomes.
Why Is "Tort Reform" On The
Agenda?
At a time when corporate profits are booming,
tort filings are declining, only two percent
of injured people sue for compensation,
punitive damages are rarely awarded, liability
insurance costs for business are minuscule and
the premium-gouging underwriting practices of
the insurance industry have been widely
exposed, it may be hard to understand why
"tort reform" is even on the
national agenda.
The answer, of course, is money. Texans
for Public Justice (TPJ) reported in a January
2000 study that political action
committees, businesses and individuals
affiliated with Texas’s two major corporate
tort groups -- Texans for Lawsuit Reform and
the Texas Civil Justice League -- contributed
$4.1 million to Bush’s two gubernatorial
campaigns, outspending every other
special-interest donor except for those in the
"energy and natural resource"
category. And major corporate interests
contributed heavily towards his presidential
bid, as well. CLICK
HERE to see TPJ's presidential-money study.
According to Dan Lambe of TexasWatch,
"The special interests got a hefty return
on their investment in George W. Bush as
Governor and there is no reason to believe
they won't be seeking the same after getting
him his new job."
TPJ's Andrew Wheat put it this way:
"Because the same interests financed
Bush's presidential bid, it's looking like,
what Yogi Berra would call, 'deja vu
all over again.'"
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