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Those odd Republicans in Washington are at it again, contradicting their core values. This new Medical Malpractice bill (HR 1215) pretends to “reduce healthcare costs” by 1) capping damages in medical malpractice cases, 2) capping attorney fees, and 3) doing it with a federal law.

This is a hot topic, and others here have been writing about it:

Caps on Damages. What bothers me is that the 7th Amendment is very clear. Our forefathers made it a core value of our founding document that citizens would have a jury of other citizens to decide damages, not some elite judge or legislator. Artificial caps on damages undermine the guaranteed right of citizens to a Jury Trial.

These Republican want to ignore that. They profess to support the Constitution above all other law, and yet want to undercut a basic constitutional right.

Capping Attorney fees – but just for the little guy. Ignore that and we move to the idea that they jump in the middle of the client-attorney relationship and want to put a control on what the attorney gets paid. I would bet a couple of them routinely talk about free enterprise, and the right to contract.

But only for the little folks, who can’t afford to pay big money to hire a lawyer. Do they ever interfere with the right of Big Corporations to contract to pay their lawyers whatever they want, including $2,000 per hour billings and up to $12 million for inside counsel? Of course not, corporations are their constituents. This is nothing but a pure political attack!

States’ Rights. Let’s ignore that, and look at the Federal Government taking control and making States follow their rules. Wait a minute, I thought the Republicans supported state’s rights? I thought they wanted local state legislator to make the laws, and leave fighting wars and printing money to the feds. I thought they were against big government?

The reality is that they are penalizing the most injured and robbing them of their rights. They are compounding the injury. Shame on them for their hypocrisy!

3 Comments

  1. Gravatar for greg malush
    greg malush

    This Is also a bill with little to no hearings on it.

    In several states, such as Arizona,. Kentucky, Pennsylvania, and Wyoming, the state Constitution explicitly prohibit caps on damages.

    So how can the people in congress from those states vote for this because it is all about Money for their re-election

  2. Mike Bryant

    Thank you both for reading and great point Greg

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