Letter to the Editor
San Francisco Chronicle
Click here to read the letter as published in the Chronicle on June 4, 2009.
The attack by personal injury lawyers on Proposition 64’s legal reform (“Consumers win with high court’s Prop. 64 decision,” Open Forum, June 1) doesn’t tell readers why the 2004 initiative was necessary.
For years, these very lawyers gave millions of political dollars to block bills to stop their extortion lawsuits against businesses of all sizes. The victims rallied, with small-business contributors to Prop. 64’s win outnumbering large contributors by at least 7 to 1.
Supporters included The Chronicle, which undertook an intensive review before editorializing that “Proposition 64 is the only sure way to end these ‘shakedown’ lawsuits.” The Chronicle observed that the initiative’s benefits included “limiting unfair competition lawsuits to … a group of people who can meet the often-stringent threshold for a class-action lawsuit.”
The California Supreme Court last month watered down that threshold. Californians are familiar with class actions in which the lawyers get millions and their clients pennies. The decision means, in some advertising cases, that the lawyers will still get millions but their clients, zilch.
What a use of our courts’ time when courtrooms are going dark at least a day a month, the state’s budget deficit is $24 billion, and 2 million potential Californian taxpayers are unemployed.
JOHN H. SULLIVAN
President, Civil Justice Association of California, Sacramento