The American Spectator

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Respectfully, Mr. Tucker is off-beam. Having wasted the best eleven years of my life in the study and practice of law, I can say a tort law exists in order to restitute those who have suffered loss, injury or damage as a result of negligence that the defendant knew or ought to have known would cause loss, injury or damage. There should be no “what ifs” or “might have beens” in the practice of tort law. Essential steps to reform are:

1. Scrap punitive damages. Tort exists to recompense actual, not putative, loss. All that punitive damages does is inflate the size of the award, leading to more appeals, increasing the cost of the process and the jackpot payable to the brethren.

2. Provide specific damages for specific injuries to specific jobs. If a manual worker loses their little finger, that is much more of a career-threatening injury than the same injury to an office worker.

3. Rediscover the law and keeps the lobbyists out. Since when did the Constitution become a means of enriching lawyers? Or is that too naive a question for a Scotsman to ask?

4. Recover the cost of litigation more aggressively. In my jurisdiction, the lawyer is responsible for the payment of costs, not the client.

p>Conservatives like me will always complain that Yasser Arafat has got rich by ripping off aid, not, as one commentator has said “by inventing a new browser.” The trial lawyers haven’t invented new browsers either. They should be remunerated accordingly. God knows what an improved world we would have if we had modest lawyers. br> — Martin Kelly br> Glasgow, Scotland /p> p> Regarding tort lawyers switching sides: In Texas, we are seeing tort lawyers sponsoring candidates for office in the Republican primary, particularly for District Court Judge. This is occurring because in many counties in Texas now, the Republican primary is the election. This is also true for statewide judicial races. The Republican Party activists are horrified by this and so far it seems that the tort lawyer types have been unsuccessful. However, money talks so it will be a constant battle to retain control of the courts. br> — Michael Bergsma