Personal Injury Law

Forced Arbitration: Tort Reform By Contract

By Wayne Parsons

Arbitration Fairnress Day was celebrated on April 29th and now the public is being educated about the evil of forced arbitration also know as "binding mandatory arbitration" or BME. Thwety five years ago when the CEO's of major insurance companies, the drug manufacturers, and big corporations coined the term "tort reform" and started to mislead the public about the need to reform the civil justice system. that campaign of outright lies and mis-information is still going on and has caused great injury to the American public and great losses to the country.

Forced Arbitration is one bullet that corporate CEOs have fired at unsuspecting citizens. First you must know that there are three things that define a democracy of the people, by the people and for the people:

1. The right to vote
2. The right to trial by jury
3. The right to sue "the King"

Okay we don't have a King - at least since Bush and Cahney have high-tailed it out of Washington, D.C. And if you look into the deceit and the scheme behind forced arbitration or BMA, you will see the greedy face of "corporateers" - the army of greed mongers who put profits ahead of people. I call them "tort deformers" not tort reformers. These high paid CEO's figured that if they couldn't get Congress and the state legislatures to eliminate the right of an average American to have a trial by a jury of citizens, they could do the same thing by putting a mandatory arbitration clause in every contract that Americans sign. All of your health insurance policies, many of your property and casualty insurance policies, the contract your wife signs when she starts her pregnancy at the local doctor's office. Contracts witha builder or a home developer for your new hime. Loan finance documents. These forced arbitration clauses are everywhere.

With an overwhelming number of pro-corporation judges now in the judiciary, the courts have upheld these one-sided agreements as part of the "right to contract". It doesn't matter to the conservative judges that the forced arbitration clause is in the fine print and that no one reads those contracts anyway - I mean who would dream that a sneaky corporation or you pediatrician would trick you into giving up one of the most important rights in the Constitution - right to trial by jury - in a contract? Well, welcome to the world of the future. George Orwell is smiling down at us from above saying "I told you so".

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2QFtl55F_Uk

I have already alerted you to the important battle in Congress that is looming as the people face off against the "tort deformers" over this corporate end run of the Constitution.

Celebrate Arbitration Fairness Day On April 29, 2009

Fact Sheet For Arbitration Fairness Act

Paul Bland at Public Justice has won impressive battles against the corporations that tout tort reform in court but he and other consumer advocates need the Congress and state legislatures to put an end to the frivolous and greedy "tort deform" movement.

Another great resource on forced arbitration and current news exposing the corporate tort deformers is found at Civil Justice and Democracy and at The Pop Tort.

What do you think about being forced to give up your right to trial by jury?

Full post as published by Honolulu Personal Injury Lawyer on May 01, 2009 (boomark / email).