KEEP THE LAWSUITS COMING

...More surprisingly, that same paper extended some rare editorial accolades to the "young Naderite lawyers" who conducted the legal action against the lawyers' use of minimum fee schedules...

...Although the answer was obvious to most people, it required a lawsuit and ultimately an unequivocal ruling by the Supreme Court before lawyers got the message and began to provide the public with more readily accessible information about what they do and charge...

...One must also wonder whether in light of Firestone's insistence that drivers were to blame for problems with their Firestone 500s, anything short of a lawsuit would ensure that all purchasers of those dangerously defective tires received the compensation due them...

...Many of the protections for the mentally ill, children, and the poor, as well as the interests we all have in a cleaner and healthier environment, have also come from the courts— again, often acting in response to lawsuits filed by public interest attorneys motivated more by the cause than by the potential fee (if any...

...They cannot be allowed to close the doors to the courthouse...

...And one columnist has urged the adoption of anything that can curb our "drunken litigiousness...

...The anti-litigation forces are already having their way...

...According to their critics, the courts are not the appropriate institution for reordering society...

...They had no political power to force the legislature to act responsibly...

...And it has been primarily in the courtroom that individuals have found protection for their right to vote, to buy a home in the neighborhood of their choice, to express dissenting and unpopular political views and to be free from unwarranted invasions of privacy...

...The victims of the use of that tool are most often the litigants in need of judicial protection of their rights—the poor, the underprivileged, the deprived minorities...

...So long as the courts can make decisions based on concepts of fairness, they will continue to be the only institution of hope for the poor, minorities, the unorganized, and those seeking to protect personal liberties and improve the quality of life for all...

...President Ronald Reagan plans to do his part to close the door further: He proposes to withdraw Federal funds for civil legal services for the poor...

...And as the energy crisis mounts and the price of gasoline continues to skyrocket, we may wish that there had been even more lawsuits to halt the proliferation of "million-dollar-a-mile" roads...

...The legislative process is often effectively closed to the poor, members of racial minorities, consumers, and environmentalists^—to all groups without political clout, organized constituencies, or well-financed lobbying efforts...

...Often the Government's response to litigation is more direct—which is a charitable way of observing that sometimes the only way to get agencies to do their job is to sue them...

...In addition to benefiting the public at large, lawsuits are necessary to compensate individual victims of malfeasance, misfeasance, or outright fraud...

...Environmentalist lawyers have been condemned for using the courts to halt "progress," in order to protect snail darters and other rare species...

...As the court of appeals noted, "It is a sad fact that the law of the land was allowed to lie unheeded until a consumer organization headed by Ralph Nader hauled the agency into a Federal court to account for its nonfeasance...

...Indeed, the legislature had displayed such callousness toward their plight that the judge issued an unprecedented warning that if the legislature did not appropriate the money to improve the hospitals, he might sell state property to provide the necessary funds...

...a court action by the Italian Historical Society to halt the issuance of an Alexander Graham Bell commemorative stamp on the ground that it was an Italian, not Bell, who invented the telephone...

...The U.S...

...Supreme Court decision invalidating the ban on advertising by pharmacists should, Kilpatrick suggested, serve notice on the legal profession that it also ought to permit advertising: "If a lawyer wants to advertise a fixed price for preparing a simple will, or making a title search, or writing a deed of trust or collecting some bad debts, shouldn't he be free to do so...

...But has not even the short march of history vindicated many of their litigation efforts...

...Beleaguered homeowners have also looked to judges to administer some relief...

...One must shudder at the even greater disadvantages blacks would suffer today if the Supreme Court had not courageously declared that our national policy could not tolerate segregated schools...

...Lawsuits not only save the public money directly but also provide indirect aid by prodding the Government to act...

...students filing legal actions against professors for having failed to provide an adequate education...

...In Alabama, for example, conditions in the mental hospitals were so deplorable that a Federal judge reluctantly assumed virtual control of them...

...According to one national news weekly, Americans "are being buried under an avalanche of lawsuits" which are "driving up the cost of products and services...

...The litigation-achieved accomplishments of such groups as the American Civil Liberties Union and the NAACP are well known...

...For example, in 1966, "in order to assist the consumer to make an informed choice," Congress mandated the establishment of a uniform grading system for tires...

...Without being able to go to court, would the victims of General Motors' "great engine switch" ever have received compensation for having been deceptively sold a car with a lower-quality Chevrolet engine instead of the highly touted Oldsmobile engine they wanted...

...Supreme Court unanimously agreed...

...In California, for example, lawsuits led directly or indirectly to the elimination of laws that set the minimum prices retailers could charge for milk and liquor...

...A leading business journal charges that litigation has become the "nation's secular religion...

...Public interest lawyers successfully went to court to challenge the laws that prohibited advertising the prices of prescription drugs...

...Consumers desperately struggling to fight inflation have also found an ally in the courts...

...Today, primarily as a result of these lawsuits, all professions are allowed to advertise-—and consumers are saving millions of dollars annually...

...But we must proceed cautiously before closing the courthouse doors...

...But as Justice William Bren-nan has observed, "A solution that shuts the courthouse door in the face of the litigant with a legitimate claim for relief, particularly a claim of deprivation of a constitutional right, seems to be not only the wrong tool but also a dangerous tool for solving the problem...

...Money and political power may close legislative doors...

...We must not lose sight of the tremendous advances that have been possible only through the courage of lawyers and judges...

...they have also protected our very lives...

...The courtroom is virtually the only place for these groups to obtain justice or compensation and to impose accountability for corporate and governmental misconduct...

...Restrictions on advertising have also fallen only after the courts have become involved...

...Yes, there has been an increase in litigation...

...The court was the only hope for the patients...

...Though the deadly hazards of DDT had been confirmed by a committee appointed by the producers and users, it took many years of litigation before DDT was finally banned...

...The U.S...

...Under the leadership of Chief Justice Warren Burger, spokesman for the anti-litigation movement, the courthouse doors are closing to taxpayers alarmed by Government malfeasance, consumers defrauded by corporate chicanery, workers whose health is sacrificed on the altar of business wealth, and individuals seeking recognition of their fundamental rights...

...Most of the scorn, however, has probably been reserved for public interest lawyers, whose lawsuits quite often are motivated by a desire to accomRay Bonner is a public-interest lawyer and journalist...

...As a result of this decision, it has been estimated by some that closing costs on home purchases in Virginia have been cut by as much as 50 per cent...

...When, eight years later, the agency still had not enacted regulations, a lawsuit was filed...

...This and other cases caused The Wall Street Journal to declare in a front-page headline: "Major Court Decisions Help Homeowners Cut High Mortgage Costs...

...Again, we find Kilpatrick observing with satisfaction that in the aftermath of the Supreme Court's rulings against lawyers' antitrust activities and in support of advertising, the Justice Department and FTC finally began to challenge the anticompetitive practices of accountants, funeral directors, lawyers, doctors, and other professionals...

...Lawsuits have not only preserved nature's wonders for future generations...

...and yes, some of it has been frivolous...

...a lawsuit by football fans to overturn their team's loss on the basis of a referee's mistake...

...plish social change...

...Conservative columnist James Jackson Kilpatrick, who is not noted for championing the use of the courts to achieve change, recognized the merits of this lawsuit...

...And lawyer advertising, according to an American Bar Association commission, has resulted in lower prices and higher-quality services...

...In a case against the State Suits have cut costs of drags, wills, houses Bar of Virginia, public-interest attorneys argued that the lawyers' time-honored practice of fixing the fees to be charged for a title examination violated the antitrust laws...

...Parks have been preserved and neighborhoods saved by lawsuits that have blocked the construction of freeways...

...The critics like to trumpet the "frivolous" cases: children suing parents for not having given them enough love...

...The anti-litigation sentiment is reinforced by what many consider to be excessive awards in malpractice and personal-injury cases, such as the $128 million awarded to the victims burned and disfigured when their Ford Pinto exploded as the result of what a jury concluded was the negligent construction of the gas tank...

...The money saved could have been better used for mass transit...

...Furthermore, the argument continues, non-elected judges certainly should not be overruling the actions of the Legislative and Executive branches...

...The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has estimated, for example, that the advertising of prices for prescription drugs and eyeglasses will save purchasers more than $500 million each year...