Asian-American Legal Defense Fund
Disability Rights Education Fund
National Council of La Raza
NOW Legal Defense Fund
April 20, 2000
Dear Senator:We are writing to urge your opposition to S.353, the so-called Class Action "Fairness" Act and the House version of the bill, H.R. 1875. We understand that an attempt might be made to attach these two bills to S. 1185, the Small Business Liability Reform Act of 1999, which Senate Majority Leader Lott has said might be considered in early May. The following civil rights organizations oppose this legislation, as it would significantly diminish the opportunity for plaintiffs to have class action litigation based on state law heard in state court and would give corporate defendants an additional strategic tool to use in attempting to avoid liability.
There are at least three reasons why our organizations are particularly troubled by these Acts:
Civil rights plaintiffs will lose their ability to choose the forum they feel most appropriate to hear their claims. Currently, plaintiffs preferring to bring their cases in state court based on state civil rights laws have the option of doing so under existing law. Loosening diversity requirements and allowing easy defendant removal to federal court means that civil rights class action plaintiffs lose the option of going to state court, even when state court offers a better option. This is of particular concern when dealing with subject areas where local and state laws may offer broader protections than federal law. In areas where state law offers broader rights and remedies, state judges who are generally more familiar with the laws in question may be better equipped than federal judges to interpret the law’s meaning.
Federal courts will become even more overcrowded. The large number of federal court vacancies contributes to a clogged civil docket. This bill will add thousands of complex, time-consuming class action cases -- all of which, by definition, will involve issues of state law with which state judges are intimately familiar but federal judges generally are not. Passage of S. 353 or H.R. 1875 will create even more of a federal court backlog and result in a considerable delay for civil rights plaintiffs using federal courts to bring federal law claims. Our federal courts are already overburdened with cases that traditionally have been dealt with in state courts. As a result, justice will not only be greatly delayed for class action plaintiffs, but for individual plaintiffs with civil cases in the clogged federal courts as well.
Mandatory Rule 11 sanctions would have a chilling effect on civil rights attorneys and plaintiffs. S. 353 would make Rule 11 sanctions for "frivolous" filings mandatory instead of discretionary; this could create a disincentive to the filing of legitimate civil rights cases. The earlier experiment with mandatory Rule 11 sanctions proved particularly harmful for the civil rights community. Several studies from that time demonstrated that civil rights plaintiffs (and their lawyers) are more likely to be subjected to Rule 11 sanctions. This includes both a disproportionate number of Rule 11 motions being filed against civil rights plaintiffs and a disproportionate number of the motions granted going against civil rights plaintiffs. This was a serious concern in the legal community at the time and was one of the reasons that imposition of sanctions under Rule 11 was made discretionary. A return to mandatory sanctions will mean a return to the higher sanction rate on civil rights plaintiffs; this, in turn, will discourage attorneys and plaintiffs from filing new and innovative civil rights claims.
For the above reasons, we urge you to oppose S. 353 and H.R. 1875. Thank you.
Sincerely,
Asian-American Legal Defense Fund
NOW Legal Defense Fund
Disability Rights Education Fund
National Council of La Raza