Story originally printed in the Tomah Journal or online at www.tomahjournal.com

Published - Thursday, June 21, 2007

Editorial: Tort reform hypocrite stumbles onto the truth

Give hypocrites credit -- they’re right 50 percent of the time.

Case in point: Former federal judge and unsuccessful U.S. Supreme Court nominee Robert Bork. As a conservative legal activist, Bork was in the forefront of “tort reform” -- the idea that frivolous lawsuits inhibit economic growth without making society more fair or just.

That was until Bork tripped and fell at a New York City social club. Now, Bork is a plaintiff in a personal injury case.

Bork is suing the Yale Club for $1 million. His suit contends the Yale Club failed to provide a handrail or stairs leading to an unreasonably high dais, which caused him to fall and sustain leg and head injuries.

Which Bork is right -- the tort reformer or the tort bringer? It’s the latter, at least in the sense that his lawsuit views medical care as a collective responsibility, not an individual one.

A fall that results in an injury, especially for someone Bork’s age, is no minor event. It can result in tens of thousands of dollars in hospital bills, or even hundreds of thousands of dollars if his injuries land him in a nursing home (those bills wouldn’t be covered by Medicare). That’s a significant financial impact, even for someone who earned six figures as a federal judge.

The fact that many people must sue to have their medical bills covered says more about the need to reform health insurance than the need to reform the legal system. Bork’s suit says, in effect, that it’s onerous -- perhaps impossible -- to expect an individual to pay a five- or six-figure medical bill on his or her own. It would be preferable that a system of universal health insurance pays for Bork’s care and eliminates the necessity of his lawsuit, but Bork has little choice but to work within the system that exists.

Yes, Robert Bork is a hypocrite. In 1995, he wrote:

“Courts are now meccas for every conceivable unanswered grievance or perceived injury. Juries dispense lottery-like windfalls, attracting and rewarding imaginative claims and far-fetched legal theories. Today's merchant enters the marketplace with trepidation - anticipating from the civil justice system the treatment that his ancestors experienced with the Barbary pirates.”

Twelve years later, Bork sees a court system not as a lottery but as necessary to protect injured people from destitution. The Robert Bork of 1995 was wrong. The Robert Bork of 2007 is right.

All stories copyright 2006 Tomah Journal and other attributed sources.