CJD: “Racial prejudice lurks behind the ‘tort reform’ movement”

That’s the conclusion of an article in the Washington University Journal of Law & Policy (with a 2007 citation date, but the press release is today). The article is available here [PDF], written by the president of and an attorney at the Center for Justice & Democracy. The conclusion:

Minorities are frequently forced to bear a disproportionately large share of this country’s health and safety problems. Whether it is inferior medical care, infringed civil rights, environmental pollution or any number of other indignities and injuries that juries are asked to evaluate every day, our civil justice system provides an essential tool to combat injustice in America.

Tort reform has a troubling and disproportionate effect on racial and ethnic minorities who have been injured and seek justice through the civil courts. In some cases, Congress has gone out of its way to exacerbate these effects. The civil justice system has been a beacon of civil rights over the last half of the twentieth century and for that it deserves to be celebrated, not stripped of its power.

–BC