Providing For Consideration of H.R. 4571, Lawsuit Abuse Reduction Act of 2004
PROVIDING FOR CONSIDERATION OF H.R. 4571, LAWSUIT ABUSE REDUCTION ACT OF 2004 -- (House of Representatives - September 14, 2004)
Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. Speaker, by direction of the Committee on Rules, I call up House Resolution 766 and ask for its immediate consideration.
The Clerk read the resolution, as follows:
H. Res. 766
Resolved, That upon the adoption of this resolution it shall be in order without intervention of any point of order to consider in the House the bill (H.R. 4571) to amend rule 11 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure to improve attorney accountability, and for other purposes. The bill shall be considered as read for amendment. The amendment in the nature of a substitute recommended by the Committee on the Judiciary now printed in the bill shall be considered as adopted. The previous question shall be considered as ordered on the bill, as amended, and on any further amendment thereto to final passage without intervening motion except: (1) one hour of debate on the bill, as amended, equally divided and controlled by the chairman and ranking minority member of the Committee on the Judiciary; (2) the further amendment printed in the report of the Committee on Rules accompanying this resolution, if offered by Representative Turner of Texas or his designee, which shall be in order without intervention of any point of order, shall be considered as read, and shall be separately debatable for 40 minutes equally divided and controlled by the proponent and an opponent; and (3) one motion to recommit with or without instructions.
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Texas (Mr. Sessions) is recognized for 1 hour.
Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. Speaker, for the purpose of debate only, I yield the customary 30 minutes to the gentleman from Massachusetts (Mr. McGovern), pending which I yield myself such time as I may consume. During consideration of this resolution, all time yielded is for the purpose of debate only.
The resolution before us is a well-balanced, modified closed rule that provides for 1 hour of debate equally divided and controlled by the chairman and ranking minority member of the Committee on the Judiciary. The rule waives all points of order against consideration of the bill and provides that the bill shall be considered as read for amendment. The rule provides that the amendment in the nature of a substitute recommended by the Committee on the Judiciary now printed in the bill shall be considered as adopted and also makes in order the amendment printed in the Committee on Rules report accompanying the resolution, if offered by the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Turner) or his designee. This amendment shall be considered as read and shall be debatable for 40 minutes equally divided and controlled by the proponent and the opponent.
Finally, this rule waives all points of order against the amendment printed in that report and provides for one motion to recommit with or without instructions.
Mr. Speaker, I rise today in strong support of the rule for H.R. 4571, the Lawsuit Abuse Reduction Act of 2004, as well as the underlying legislation. This bill offered by the gentleman from San Antonio, Texas (Mr. Smith), my good friend, is carefully constructed legislation that will create a disincentive for attorneys and plaintiffs to file many of the frivolous lawsuits that currently clog our court system and act as a drain on our Nation's economy.
Just 6 months ago almost to the day, I came to the floor to manage the rule for H.R. 339, the Personal Responsibility in Food Consumption Act. Later that day the House voted overwhelmingly by a vote of 267 to 139 to require courts to dismiss frivolous lawsuits seeking damages for injuries resulting from obesity and its intended health problems that are filed against the producers and sellers of food. Through passing this legislation today, we have another opportunity to help bring our tort system back to reality by amending the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure to impose greater attorney and client accountability for pursuing other frivolous or nuisance lawsuits.
Our current tort system costs American consumers well over $200 billion a year, the equivalent of a 5 percent tax on wages. Our courts today handle cases ranging from legitimate claims to those that are highly suspect and wasteful of time and resources. Some of these examples of lawsuit abuse include a woman in Knoxville, Tennessee, who sought $125,000 in damage against McDonald's, claiming a hot pickle dropped from a hamburger, burned her chin and caused her mental injury. Her husband also sued for $15,000 for loss of consortium. Or the case of the Girl Scouts of America in metro Detroit, who have to sell 36,000 boxes of cookies each year just to pay for their liability insurance. In fact, according to a former Girl Scout from the greater Philadelphia, Pennsylvania area, frivolous litigation is making it increasingly hard for them to even sell their cookies and their local convenience stores will no longer allow these girls to set up their booths anymore for fear of liability issues.
This economic drain, created by frivolous lawsuits on American productivity, is unacceptable and prevents the American economy from being as competitive as it should be with the rest of the world.
H.R. 4571 will help to discourage the filing of frivolous lawsuits by restating several important provisions to rule 11 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure that were changed in 1993 and add several new deterrents against baseless claims. In short, this legislation will make rule 11 sanctions against attorneys or parties who file frivolous lawsuits mandatory rather than discretionary. It will remove rule 11 safe harbor provisions that currently allow parties and their attorneys to avoid sanctions for making frivolous claims by withdrawing them within 21 days after motions for sanctions that have been filed. It implements a "three strikes and you're out" provision that would disbar any lawyer for at least 1 year that filed three frivolous lawsuits in Federal court. It allows for rule 11 sanctions for frivolous or harassing conduct during discovery, and it allows monetary sanctions, including attorney fees and compensation against a represented party.
The Lawsuit Abuse Reduction Act also provides new protections against frivolous lawsuits such as extending rule 11 sanctions to State cases that affect interstate commerce, and reducing forum shopping by requiring that a plaintiff in a civil tort action may sue only where he or she lives or was injured or where the defendant's principal place of business is located.
A recent poll found that 83 percent of likely voters believe that there are too many lawsuits in America and 76 percent believe that lawsuit abuse results in higher prices for goods and services. Another poll found that 73 percent of Americans support requiring sanctions against attorneys who file frivolous lawsuits, just as H.R. 4571 would do.
Small businesses, the engine of job growth in our economy, rank the cost and availability of liability insurance as second only to the costs of health care as their top priority, and both problems are fueled by frivolous lawsuits. A recent report by AEI-Brookings Joint Center for Regulatory Studies has concluded: "The tort liability price tag for small businesses in America is $88 billion a year" and that "small businesses bear 68 percent of the business tort liability cost but only take in 25 percent of the business revenue." The small businesses studied in this report account for 98 percent of the total number of small businesses with employees in the United States.
Mr. Speaker, I believe it is time for Congress to listen to what the average Americans say about frivolous lawsuits. It is time for us to hear the concerns of small businessmen and -women in our communities, along with consumers, who list frivolous lawsuits as one of their greatest impediments to success.
And it is time for us to get serious about encouraging economic growth, job creation, and international competitiveness by ending the practice that keeps our economy from thriving. The choice presented by this legislation is stark and clear and will demonstrate whether we support the frivolous actions of the trial lawyer and the drain that they place on the American economy or whether we support American workers and businesses.
I encourage all of my colleagues to stand up for our economy and for consumers by supporting this rule and the underlying legislation.
Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
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Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Republicans do listen to Democrats, and we have had a number of times where the Republican Party, the majority party, has talked about tort reforms and other issues that are important to consumers.
One of the persons that we have listened to repeatedly in this debate is perhaps one of the most successful trial lawyers who is now a United States Senator, and his name is John Edwards. Senator Edwards has written in Newsweek that "lawyers who bring frivolous lawsuits should face tough mandatory sanctions with the '3-strikes' penalty." That is what Mr. Edwards has said. Senator Edwards has also said that he "believes we need a national system in place that will weed out meritless lawsuits." That is exactly what H.R. 4571 would do.
We are listening to the American people. We are listening to people who are lawyers who are engaged in the business of advocating on behalf of people who have been harmed. But sometimes those people know most about the system, as Senator John Edwards, who knows best that we need to reform the system. That is what we are doing here today. I do appreciate the opportunity to have Senator Edwards' remarks that were in Newsweek magazine included today, because I think it is important for the American public to hear that.
Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Bristol, Indiana (Mr. Chocola).
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Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding, and I am pleased to respond. First of all, I would like to say that the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Turner) requested its removal.
Secondly, I would like to say that the provision actually allows a covered company under this provision that they have the absolute right not only to remove their case to Federal court, but they can remove the case to any Federal court in the country that they would like, and that they can pick the Federal court if they have one, wherever the Federal court is, and have the case there; whereas our bill prevents unfair forum shopping by making sure that cases are actually brought in States that actually have a connection to the case.
As the gentleman may be aware, there are abuses that take place all across this country, including in Illinois and Mississippi, where there are cases that are accepted by courts where no one actually even lives in those jurisdictions.
I thank the gentleman for asking for a response.
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Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. Chairman, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from Georgia (Mr. Linder), a member of the Committee on Rules.
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Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, today, as I had stated, this is balanced legislation that is important to consumers. It is important to judges who sit to make themselves ready for those lawsuits that are necessary to make wise decisions on. But frivolous lawsuits are clogging our courts.
Mr. Speaker, I would remind this body that we have debated numerous tort reform issues, and one which was decided as a local issue in Texas was about medical malpractice, tort reform for medical malpractice. It was passed last year. It became law in January of this year. And one of the most important health care systems in Texas, a company called Christus HealthCare Systems, has announced earlier this month that as a result of those tort reform changes in Texas, they are able to put $21 million that previously they had set aside for lawsuits, that would go right back into their hospitals, to health care, to retraining of their employees, to make their system better, to make health care work better for every single consumer, and most of all to hire more nurses which is where the shortage was in their hospital.
Tort reform issues and ideas work but so do those things like we are doing today, H.R. 4571, that says we are going to alleviate and stop frivolous lawsuits from clogging our courts. I would remind this wonderful body that the young chairman, the gentleman from San Antonio, Texas (Mr. Smith), has worked very diligently to ensure that this is balanced legislation that was brought to the floor, as he appeared yesterday in the Committee on Rules to talk about the need for this. I think we are listening to the special interests and we admit in the Republican Party we do have a specialty interest, they are call consumers. They are called taxpayers. And those special interest people that the Republican Party represents, we will continue to do so with common sense legislation that will allow the United States Congress to speak on issues that are important.
Mr. Speaker, I encourage all of my colleagues to stand up to support not only this rule but also the underlying legislation that is good for consumers. It is good for small businesses. It is good to ensure that America's economic growth continues. And most of all, it is good for the people, like Senator Edwards noted, who are there on the front line in our courts who say that frivolous lawsuits must end. The United States Congress will speak today. Every single Member of this body will have a chance to make that firm decision whether we want to end frivolous lawsuits or whether we are going to allow the status quo.
I urge my fellow Members to please support this underlying legislation and we will make a strong statements on behalf of consumers.
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Mr. SESSIONS. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time, and I move the previous question on the resolution.
The previous question was ordered.