Don't talk to me about Stella Liebeck.
Just like a virus hoax or a collection of the "thirty funniest blonde jokes of all TIME!", news of the latest Stella Awards turns up in my mailbox with irritating regularity. For those unfamiliar with these awards, the point of the site is to ridicule frivolous lawsuits, and to convince Americans that their justice system is in urgent need of reform.
Why is that so irritating, you ask?
Well, first off, there's Stella Liebeck herself, the site's "mascot" as it were. Most everyone is familiar with her story, if not her name. She is the woman who famously spilt coffee in her lap in 1992 and successfully sued McDonald's for damages, receiving an award reportedly amounting to $2.7 million dollars. The breaking news of her case set the world of water cooler gossip afire. What kind of legal system could allow such a ridiculous outcome? Tort reformers suddenly seemed a little less crazy. Obviously, something needed to be done.
However, the facts about the case are more complex than that facile summary, and those facts are available to anyone who cares to look. The American Association for Justice and the Consumer Attorneys of California provide decent accounts that demonstrate the clear merits of Stella's case. Snopes provides a more self-consciously balanced review, and lists a few other common (and patently false) anecdotes about legal absurdities. The Stella Awards admit on their site that Liebeck's case is a poor example for their cause. Read the accounts if you haven't already. I promise you'll be surprised.
The larger issue is even more distressing. People are far too willing to jump on the hobby-horse of "tort reform". (I hate using that phrase. It was coined by the right wing to make providing justice to the public sound like a problem in need of "reform".) A key goal of tort reformers is to cap punitive damages and blunt their effectiveness, so that frivolous damage claims are less of a burden. An unfortunate but necessary side-effect of such a policy is that punitive damages would be less effective in all cases, and not just frivolous ones. Punitive damages are a vital tool for discouraging offenders with deep pockets. When making decisions about the justice system, surely we should be less concerned with burdening the affluent than with justice for the disadvantaged.
Read this letter for an interesting opinion on what abuses of the justice system we should really be concerned about.
Why is that so irritating, you ask?
Well, first off, there's Stella Liebeck herself, the site's "mascot" as it were. Most everyone is familiar with her story, if not her name. She is the woman who famously spilt coffee in her lap in 1992 and successfully sued McDonald's for damages, receiving an award reportedly amounting to $2.7 million dollars. The breaking news of her case set the world of water cooler gossip afire. What kind of legal system could allow such a ridiculous outcome? Tort reformers suddenly seemed a little less crazy. Obviously, something needed to be done.
However, the facts about the case are more complex than that facile summary, and those facts are available to anyone who cares to look. The American Association for Justice and the Consumer Attorneys of California provide decent accounts that demonstrate the clear merits of Stella's case. Snopes provides a more self-consciously balanced review, and lists a few other common (and patently false) anecdotes about legal absurdities. The Stella Awards admit on their site that Liebeck's case is a poor example for their cause. Read the accounts if you haven't already. I promise you'll be surprised.
The larger issue is even more distressing. People are far too willing to jump on the hobby-horse of "tort reform". (I hate using that phrase. It was coined by the right wing to make providing justice to the public sound like a problem in need of "reform".) A key goal of tort reformers is to cap punitive damages and blunt their effectiveness, so that frivolous damage claims are less of a burden. An unfortunate but necessary side-effect of such a policy is that punitive damages would be less effective in all cases, and not just frivolous ones. Punitive damages are a vital tool for discouraging offenders with deep pockets. When making decisions about the justice system, surely we should be less concerned with burdening the affluent than with justice for the disadvantaged.
Read this letter for an interesting opinion on what abuses of the justice system we should really be concerned about.