WHY AMERICA NEEDS A STRONG CIVIL JUSTICE SYSTEM
What can you buy after receiving $85 billion in a taxpayer bailout of your business? The executives at insurance giant American International Group have an answer; within days of staving off bankruptcy with taxpayer money, AIG racked up nearly a half-million dollar tab at a posh California resort. Now AIG wants an additional $38 billion from you and me.
People of all political parties and ideologies are outraged over AIG’s apparent belief that it can act irresponsibly without suffering any consequences. Yet, the actions of Wall Street and our nation’s banks that led to our current financial crisis demonstrate AIG is not alone in the belief that “accountability” is a precept inapplicable to corporate America.
When the outrage over AIG’s arrogance and our nation’s financial meltdown subsides many questions will need to be answered, among which is the question of how America found itself in the position where corporations and their officers believe they can engage in wrongful and negligent conduct without being held responsible. The answer is rather simple.
Over the past eight years big corporations took advantage of all of us. They pushed for lax regulations, no oversight, and no accountability in almost all areas of business. Leading the charge has been Washington’s largest lobby, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
The U.S. Chamber represents the biggest domestic and foreign corporations and their CEOs. Afraid to speak out on their own, these businesses and their leaders hide behind this corporate lobby machine. The U.S. Chamber is caked in mud from all its dirty work to protect negligent corporations, lobbying for elimination of government oversight and accountability, the causes of the financial predicament stressing our nation today.
Again, look at AIG. A recent report revealed that AIG has given at least $23 million this decade to the U.S. Chamber. The majority of this money, $15 million, was pledged in 2003 immediately after the passage of Sarbanes-Oxley. The goal: undo this legislation enacted in response to a series of major corporate and accounting scandals that shook the securities markets, including the scandals at Enron, Tyco International, Adelphia, Peregrine Systems and WorldCom. Apparently, the U.S. Chamber and its corporate benefactors feel no need for corporate America to be held accountable for fraudulent and other wrongful conduct.
Now five years later we are in another financial crisis with U.S. Chamber again at the center of the storm. During these five years, U.S. Chamber has been the leader in pushing for less regulation, less oversight, and less accountability. Their favorite target is the legal system, trying to eviscerate it at every turn so those injured by the negligence of corporations are left with no recourse.
If there has ever been a calamity that demonstrates why we need a strong civil justice system to hold wrongdoers accountable, our current financial situation is it. The American people were lied to and investors were duped. CEOs are walking away with multi-million dollar golden parachutes while employees are left jobless and retirees see their savings and 401ks obliterated.
This is the kind of justice that U.S. Chamber and other corporations subscribe to but definitely not the justice the American people want or need.
So, what has the Chamber proposed to do about the financial crisis? In 2002, U.S. Chamber CEO Tom Donohue stated, “There is no right for business to go to government to take care of their follies and their errors.” Well, that was then and this is now. The U.S. Chamber has been one of the loudest voices begging for a government bailout to fix the follies and errors of corporate America. The government listened.
The cure being dispensed for our financial ills is government borrowing of astronomical sums of money, effectively mortgaging away our children’s, grandchildren’s and great-grandchildren’s futures, so government can intervene to undo the damage caused to the American people.
To be clear, the issue is not whether a government bailout is good or bad, was needed or not. The issue is one of unrestrained corporate greed, a philosophy of valuing profit over people that ultimately resulted in the loss of the former and injury to the later.
In other words, the present economic catastrophe has reinforced the importance of holding corporate and other wrongdoers accountable so they will act responsibly and not chase profit at the expense of people’s lives and wellbeing.
U.S. Chamber has been on the wrong side of the accountability issue time and time again but the Maryland Trial Lawyers Association has not. The MTLA has always fought to hold corporate and other wrongdoers accountable for the harm they cause. We believe in valuing the lives of people over the profits of corporations.
We hope with this latest crisis, the days of negligent corporations trampling over the rest of us are finished. Yet, hope is not enough. The Maryland Trial Lawyers Association will continue to fight for the rights of people to a fair and just legal system.
