An Ohio federal court judge held that punch-card balloting is not, in and of itself, racially discriminatory. The ACLU sued for a declaration that the punch card ballots in Ohio discriminated against minorities because minorities live predominantly in counties that use punch card systems. The full AP story is here.
The lawsuit alleged that most of the 92,000 ballots that did not have a vote for president recorded were punch card ballots.
Judge David Dowd held that:
While Democratic candidate John Kerry was reaching his decision to concede President Bush’s victory in the presidential race, rather than pursue an almost certainly unsuccessful challenge to the Ohio vote count, running mate John Edwards “counseled [him] against swift surrender”, according to the AP:
One senior Democrat familiar with the discussions said Edwards was suggesting to Kerry that he shouldn’t concede.
The official said Edwards, a trial lawyer, wanted to make sure all options were explored and that Democrats pursued them as thoroughly as Republicans would if the positions were reversed.
The mischievous headline is that of James Taranto at WSJ “Best of the Web“.
As I documented through the night at PointOfLaw.com, voters gave doctors and the business community some major victories in yesterday’s ballot measures. Limits on malpractice lawyers’ fees passed resoundingly in Florida, in a stinging rebuke to the trial bar. Among three other states considering med-mal ballot measures, doctors won decisively in Nevada and lost in Wyoming, while Oregon’s measure was slightly trailing but too close to call. (Update Nov. 9: late returns show one of the two Wyoming measures apparently passing after all.)
In California, in a convincing victory for the business community and good sense, voters approved Proposition 64 by a wide margin, requiring lawyers to demonstrate actual injury before invoking the state’s broad unfair-practices statute in private cases. (Thank you, Arnold.) Colorado voters lopsidedly defeated a trial-lawyer-sponsored measure to expand litigation over alleged construction defects. And in the two hot judicial contests, for seats on the Illinois and West Virginia Supreme Courts, trial-lawyer-backed candidates lost in both. Details on all these races can be found on PointOfLaw.com. Also, voters ignored this site’s advice and passed all eleven state marriage amendments on the ballot.
Finally, some politicians whose ambitions this website has followed were locked in too-close-to-call races: Washington state AG Christine Gregoire (see Oct. 28) was slightly trailing a GOP opponent in her bid for governor, while former trial lawyer lobbyist and Bush HUD secretary Mel Martinez (see Sept. 3) was leading by 80,000 votes in his Florida Senate race against Democrat Betty Castor. (Update: Martinez wins). John Edwards’s vice-presidential ambitions seem at the moment to depend on an unlikely reversal of Ohio results in late vote counting, while his home state of North Carolina went Republican both in the presidential race and in filling Edwards’s old seat. (Update: Kerry and Edwards concede).
“Legal battles already have broken out in many states, including battleground states Iowa, Ohio and Florida, as Republicans and Democrats turned to the courts to determine voter eligibility, electronic voting and handling of absentee and provisional ballots. … President George W Bush’s Republican party vowed today it would match or even outnumber the 10,000 lawyers monitoring battleground states for Democratic challenger Senator John Kerry on election day tomorrow.” (P. Parameswaran, “Army of lawyers monitors US poll”, The Australian, Nov. 2). More: Larry Ribstein comments on the prospect of a litigated election (via Bainbridge). And Rick Hasen’s election law blog has much more.
“Not a single ballot has been counted in the presidential election, yet Florida is already teeming with lawsuits charging the state and its county elections supervisors with voter disenfranchisement, a legal muddle likely to grow worse before Election Day.” (Abby Goodnough, “In ’04 Florida, Lawsuits Begin Before Election”, New York Times, Oct. 14). “The legal combat in Ohio over the fundamental issue of who can vote is recurring in virtually every battleground state this year, in what experts say is fast becoming, in its final weeks, the most litigious, lawyer-fraught election in history.” (James Dao, “As Election Nears, Parties Begin Another Round of Legal Battles”, New York Times, Oct. 18). See also Sept. 22.
Plaintiffs defending the insane $10.1 billion class action judgment (Feb. 8; Mar. 24, 2003) have retained as co-counsel a law firm associated with a Republican Illinois Supreme Court justice in an effort to have him disqualified from the case. (Paul Hampel, St. Louis Post-Dispatch, “Smaller court may hear tobacco case in Madison County”, Oct. 3; Ameet Sachdev, “Philip Morris seeks removal of law firm”, Chicago Tribune, Sep. 1 (no longer online)). The Edwardsville Intelligencer (in a strange story whose math seems to be wrong in other particulars) reports that Madison County has received a $1.7 million windfall in interest from Philip Morris from the bond (Apr. 4, 2003) it posted to appeal that judgment. (Steve Horrell, “County is cashing in”, Oct. 8).
The Seattle Times has a retrospective look back at the comprehensive tobacco settlement (Feb. 28 and links therein) negotiated in large part by Washington state Attorney General Christine Gregoire, and notes the irony that it forced the state to ally itself with Philip Morris to protest the amount of the bond (see also Apr. 30, 2003). (Andrew Garber, “Tobacco settlement Gregoire negotiated not popular with all”, Oct. 4). But the bad news for Altria shareholders, states hoping to continue receiving tobacco funds, and the ability of Americans to conduct business is that plaintiffs continue to pile on with similarly meritless class action lawsuits, waiting to find the combination of judges who dislike tobacco companies enough to expand class action law rather than rule in their favor. Plaintiffs’ lawyers will bring dozens of these lawsuits, and need win only one multi-billion dollar judgment to become the new owners of the enterprise. The Massachusetts Supreme Court recently signed off on a class action against Philip Morris, and lower courts in Missouri and Ohio have followed suit. (AP, Sep. 17; Theo Emery, AP, Aug. 16).
American Medical News has additional details on the Ohio cerebral palsy medical malpractice case of Hollins v. Jordan, which we covered Aug. 31. Interesting new and previously unreported details include: Hollins was an intrauterine growth-retarded baby, yet the plaintiff sought to blame his medical problems on a decision to hold a C-section in two hours instead of one; plaintiffs asked for triple the damages they had disclosed in an expert report; Geoffrey Fieger would regularly interrupt lawyers for the other side as if “to emulate TV trials in which lawyers can do and say whatever comes to mind.” Though Fieger wouldn’t talk to the American Medical News, the two lawyers gave an interview to an Illinois newspaper that seems to be unaware that the judge overturned the May verdict. (Tanya Albert, “Judge: Mega-verdict spawned by passion”, Oct. 11; Mark Samuels, “Difficult Questions: Who Should Pay And How Much?”, The Southern Illinoisan, Sep. 2; James F. McCarty, “Disabled boy gets $30 million”, Cleveland Plain Dealer, May 25). You may or may not be disturbed to learn that there is a Geoffrey Fieger fan club that was unhappy with the Ohio court’s decision, though don’t expect to find much in the way of reasoned analysis there. (Update, Nov. 20: verdict reinstated.)
In other cerebral palsy litigation news, the Wall Street Journal tells the tale of Brenda Stoltz. The lawyers she retained were excited about the prospect of a multi-million-dollar case involving future lifetime medical care of a brain-damaged baby, but when the child died shortly after, the attorneys dropped the case. (Rachel Zimmerman and Joseph T. Hallinan, “As Malpractice Caps Spread, Lawyers Turn Away Some Cases”, Oct. 8 ($), reprint; Grunt Doc blog, Oct. 8; Brad Parker, Galen’s Log blog, Oct. 8). The Journal article notes one side effect with non-economic damages caps; people without income–the elderly, the young, homemakers–who suffer wrongful death can be left without real recourse, though this is true for many types of untimely death.
If you’re not reading our sister site PointOfLaw.com, you’re missing out on a lot. I’ve been doing about half my blog writing over there, on topics that include: a powerful new St. Louis Post-Dispatch investigation of asbestos litigation in Madison County, Ill. (here, here and here, with more to come, and note this too); the busy borrowings of Harvard’s Larry Tribe; when “not-for-profits” organize employment suits; Erin Brockovich’s respectability; crime without intent; experts and the CBS scandal; stay open through a hurricane, go to jail; suits over failure to put warnings on sand (yes, sand); West Virginia legal reform; Merrill Lynch/Enron trial; Hayek and the common law, reconsidered; getting creative about tapping homeowners’ policies; AdBusters sues to have its ads run; plaintiff’s lawyers represent criminal defendants to put drugmakers behind the eight ball; update on the law firm that competes on price; Spitzer and investors; Ohio med-mal crisis (and more); a welcome Schwarzenegger veto; dangers of firing your lawyer; ephedra retailer litigation; churchruptcies (if banks can do it…); and hardball in nonprofit hospital litigation.
Plus Ted Frank on tort reform in Mississippi and Jim Copland on California’s Proposition 64 (which would reform the notorious s. 17200 statute); the federal tobacco trial and Boeken; gender bias at work; and Rule 11 revival.
Better bookmark PointOfLaw.com now, before you forget.