The threat from attack attorneys is no joke

There are increasing reports about how environmentalists are beginning to place their trust in global warming lawsuits against the auto industry, electric utilities, and the like. Racial reparations litigation is beginning to absorb much of the energy that used to go into political agitation for civil rights. This is is occurring in so many areas now that journalist William Greider has proposed that trial lawyers have emerged as the natural leadership of the left in America today. He may be right.

After years of refusing to govern our trial lawyers, it seems they have decided to take it upon themselves to govern us. It is not too late to do something about it. This, however, is not a problem that can be solved overnight by a quick fix such as tort reform legislation. The ideas that underlie the new legal system and way of governing were born in the academy. This is where our judges and lawyers learned them. These ideas are being spread among the general public by the system itself. For instance, these lawsuits teach us again and again the principle that some distant institution with a lot of money is responsible for each individual's problems. The first step in turning things around is to come to a real understanding of exactly what we did wrong in changing the rules of our legal system and handing the trial lawyers so much power.

Until we reverse this process, it will remain the rule that if you want to hurt someone in America, you may not be able to accomplish it with impunity using a scalpel or a car. However, do it with a lawsuit and no one will lay a glove on you.

Walter Olson, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, New York, is author of several books. His latest is The Rule of Lawyers: How the New Litigation Elite Threatens America's Rule of Law. This article is adapted from a lecture given at Hillsdale (Mich.) College.

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