Word: torts
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...This is not a hard problem to fix. Tort reform is not rocket science. A reasonable bill passed the House of Representatives just last year but died in the Senate, where the trial-lawyer lobby rules. The elements of a fix are simple: no limit on plaintiffs' lost earnings or other costs, a reasonable cap on pain and suffering ($250,000 in the House bill), a similar cap on punitive damages, serious penalties for frivolous lawsuits...
This is not a hard problem to fix. Tort reform is not rocket science. A reasonable bill passed the House of Representatives just last year but died in the Senate, where the trial-lawyer lobby rules. The elements of a fix are simple: no limit on plaintiffs' lost earnings or other costs, a reasonable cap on pain and suffering ($250,000 in the House bill), a similar cap on punitive damages, serious penalties for frivolous lawsuits...
Last spring, the BLSA called for Law School Dean Robert C. Clark to punish Professor of Law M. David Rosenberg for telling students that “feminism, Marxism and the blacks have contributed nothing” to tort law. In a separate incident, one student had posted the epithet “nig” to a class website...
...Republicans, that would yield something closer to real legislative control. All it would take is the help of a few switch-hitting Democrats to give the G.O.P. the 60 votes needed to move legislation without risk of filibuster. With Orrin Hatch running the Judiciary Committee, the President's tort-reform measures will easily make it to the floor; if Richard Shelby takes over Banking from Paul Sarbanes, expanded federal oversight becomes less likely. Republican priorities like Bush's energy plan, missile defense, a partial-birth-abortion ban and continued tax cutting all stand a stronger chance of passage...
Even when tort reforms are put in place, they can take time to bite. In Nevada, where liability caps were passed last month, most insurers have declined to lower rates until they see the change reflected on their balance sheets, which could take years. They may have a point: courts in six states have struck down as unconstitutional limits on a jury's ability to determine damages in malpractice cases, and lawyers in Nevada are readying a case against the new limits...