Too bad the courts have decided to leave the Eighth Amendment’s Excessive Fines Clause on the shelf, it might otherwise be helpful to everyone from Virginia motorists to sexual harassment defendants (Ralph Reiland, “The ignored amendment”, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, Aug. 27). More resources here, here, and here (noting Supreme Court’s ruling in Browning-Ferris that the clause restrains excessive fines only when payable to the government, not private parties).
Excessive fines
Too bad the courts have decided to leave the Eighth Amendment’s Excessive Fines Clause on the shelf, it might otherwise be helpful to everyone from Virginia motorists to sexual harassment defendants (Ralph Reiland, “The ignored amendment”, Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, Aug. 27). More resources here, here, and here (noting Supreme Court’s ruling in Browning-Ferris that the clause […]
4 Comments
I wouldn’t mind having the class of attorneys pay what they owe defendants for their weak and frivolous claims to the last button on the last shirt.
End all litigation privileges. Watch the judges fall over themselves to rein in the exposure of their good pals, the lawyers, finding all manner of pretexts and constitutional muster.
A rule of law that requires clear definitions of infractions and punishments proportional to an offense is a key component to a civilized society. When a statute permits punitive damages, it is permitting a fine, and that fine has to bounded in some way. What is so difficult about that?
We all know that a rule banning the execution of the retarded will be gamed, as it was in the Wendy’s case when a man who held a full time job and his partner systematically executed the potential witnesses to a robbery of a Wendy’s in Queens, New York.
If a million dollar fine is appropriate for inappropriate talk, wouldn’t beheading be appropriate for Senator Kennedy’s hypocrisy with respect to offshore windmills? I think so.
It is said:
“If a million dollar fine is appropriate for inappropriate talk, wouldn’t beheading be appropriate for Senator Kennedy’s hypocrisy with respect to offshore windmills?”
Why lower the bar for beheading so?
I pity those poor souls in Virginia who pushed too hard on the gas pedal. They’ll certainly not get to enjoy the new highways they’ve financed. This is a hyper-typical tactic of a legislature that will soon be asking itself why they were not successful in collecting enough money to pay for said highway. Those motorists will be more than happy to take themselves (and their tax dollars) to a more hospitable state.
It can be summed up as such: Who is John Galt?