Nearly every runaway jury verdict is the result of judges permitting attorneys to run amok with emotionally prejudicial arguments, or with junk evidence or legal theories. Not to mention the fact that the voir dire process often serves to prevent “everyday people” from being on the jury in the first place.

The animosity towards lawyers reflects that it’s lawyers who encourage and profit from the abuse of the judicial system; seek to aggrandize their role in society with regulation-through-litigation; and successfully lobby legislatures for laws that transfer wealth from productive sectors of society to lawyers. Are all lawyers guilty of this? Of course not; heck, I’m a lawyer myself. But the legal profession as a whole has certainly resisted self-policing.

People who whine about tort reform always seem to forget that everyday people are the ones who are awarding verdicts. If they’ve got a problem with the judicial system, the problem is more likely in themselves than in the lawyers who represent the plaintiffs.