The Wall Street Journal

July 30, 2004

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Torts May Not Be Perfect, But They Beat Regulation
July 30, 2004; Page A11

The problem with David Robinson's familiar analysis of John Edward's career as a "victims'" lawyer ("Lawyer Logic: A Villain for Every Victim1," July 19) is that he wants to have it both ways: no regulation and no tort law.

Conservatives routinely both decry command and control regulation and berate trial lawyers for winning awards from juries in malpractice and product liability law suits.

Government regulation is said to be bad because government workers, who have no incentives to find better, cheaper solutions and who are not the experts on the front lines, unnecessarily drive up costs in heavy handed overprotection resulting in proportionally lower benefits to society. High cost, low benefit.

Trial lawyers who win big awards damage society by driving up insurance costs: high cost, low benefit.

But don't we have to choose if we are to have some form of societal protection against bad medicine and shoddy manufacturing? What is the best way to regulate the marketplace: through governmental regulation or through tort law?

Tort law is far more efficient than governmental regulation. It uncovers egregious examples of malfeasance by doctors, manufacturers and service providers, and persuades juries (who are not exactly impressionable bleeding hearts) to determine the fair costs to victims.

This society long ago turned the corner from a legal consensus of caveat emptor and caveat laboror. Telling the widow and children of a worker who was killed falling from a scaffolding that had no safety net that she is out of luck is no longer an option.

Trial lawyers do the job of helping our society set its standards of care. The problem may well be with the insurance system that lacks competition -- an area ripe for governmental scrutiny and regulation.

Christina C. Forbes, Esq.
Washington

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