The Bushes of Madison County

In the continuing debate over tort reform, Madison County, Illinois, is the designated poster child for those who favor tighter standards for the certification of tort class action lawsuits.  The business-oriented American Tort Reform Association ranks the county Number One in its annual listing of so-called "Judicial Hellholes®".

President Bush has identified tort reform and liability containment as a priority in his second term.   Today at PointofLaw.com, James Copland reports that the President will be paying a personal visit to Madison County this Wednesday, to call attention to the problems he perceives there and to call for a Congressional exorcism of the resident demons.   Says the linked story in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch:

Presidential visits typically are arranged to highlight a success story, such as an overachieving Head Start program or a thriving small business. But Wednesday's presidential visit - the first to Madison County by a sitting president since Jimmy Carter stopped in Alton during a 1979 Mississippi River cruise - appears to be based on the county's reputation in some circles as a haven for so-called frivolous lawsuits.

Bush's appearance will be an invitation-only event at Collinsville's Gateway Center.  It was arranged just two weeks after the American Tort Reform Association ranked Madison County for the second year as the nation's top "judicial hellhole."  The group ranked St. Clair County second.

Whether the distinction is deserved or not - and there is no shortage of debate on the subject - no one in Madison or St. Clair counties would admit to being thrilled that the area will be portrayed in the national media this week as a symbol of what's wrong with the nation's courts.

One suspects that the invitation-only audience will not include vocal defenders of the good name of Madison County and its judiciary, such as local litigator Evan Schaeffer of Notes from the (Legal) Underground, whose Madison County apologia are available in his weblog's Tort "Reform" Archive.  If only because his writing is never less than entertaining (and is often much, much more), we can hope that Evan will be able to provide a report on the President's visit despite being compelled to keep his distance from the event itself.

Presidential interest may have been signaled first when Madison County was singled out in comments by Yale Law School Professor George Priest at the December 15, 2004, White House conference on "lawsuit abuse."  Professor Priest's remarks (and the President's approving noises thereon) can be read in the official White House transcript, accessible here.

[A personal note: Before he joined the law faculty at Yale, Professor Priest spent two years teaching at UCLA School of Law where, in 1980, he presided over my second-year "Remedies" course.  In retrospect, I have decided that he did a fine job, although his approach to the subject was rather too theoretical for my tastes at the time.  Live and learn.]

Update [01/05/05 1700 PST]: On the day of the presidential visit, Evan Schaeffer graciously extends space to a pro-reform guest, Allen Adomite (Evan promises his own comments later), while  Professor Bainbridge ponders the scope of the President's mandate, if any, on tort reform issues.

Comments

[Evan]

George: Thanks for the kind words, and for the links. Unfortunately, I can't promise much in the way of a report. I thought World Series tickets were hard to get, but with only 600 tickets to see the Bush speech, they're about 5000x harder--all but impossible. And if I can't be there, I won't be able to add anything at all to the newspaper reports, except to straighten out any mangled facts.