No Curbs on Class Actions

The House has passed a GOP-backed bill designed to make it much harder for consumers to deter corporate misconduct and seek redress in court. A similar measure, this one backed by the tobacco industry, gun manufacturers and the auto and chemical companies, among others, has come before the Senate Judiciary Committee, and that is where the matter should die.

Passed on a largely party-line vote in the House, the bill would remove most class-action lawsuits from state courts, where they are often filed, and send them to federal courts. Class actions, which involve large groups of individuals with similar complaints, would come under federal rules tougher than those in state courts, so fewer of these lawsuits would proceed and, of those that did, few would be successful. That’s why several key business groups and industries support the measure, and that’s also why this is an unwise step.

The only way that individuals of modest means can press their claims against large and wealthy corporations often is by joining forces with similarly aggrieved people in a class-action suit. That was certainly true of shipyard workers made ill by their unknowing exposure to asbestos insulation and of young women rendered sterile by their use of the Dalkon Shield intrauterine device. Class actions, sometimes involving tens of thousands of people with similar injuries or claims, are a far more efficient way for courts to decide these matters than hearing each matter individually.

Critics regard many class actions as claims without merit, designed simply to pick deep corporate pockets. Others are concerned that in deciding class actions involving tobacco and drugs, for example, the actions of state court judges will have nationwide implications.

Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist’s position should be persuasive here. Rehnquist, along with the Conference of Chief Justices of state courts, 15 state attorneys general and a broad array of consumer and civil rights groups, oppose this measure, arguing that it would further burden the federal courts. Congress has created a slew of new federal crimes in recent years at the same time it has tried to cut court funding. Meanwhile, bitter partisan wrangling over judicial nominees has left 62 seats on the federal bench vacant.

The House considered similar ends-justifies-means curbs on class actions in 1997. It was a bad idea then, and it’s a bad idea now.