Comments on: Don’t delegate foreign and counter-terror policy to trial lawyers

By: Timothy E. Harris

Timothy E. Harris — Mon, 26 Sep 2016 00:08:23 +0000

All libertarians I know acknowledge that without Rule of Law, which includes the court systems, no government can effectively defend liberty.

Most also feel that free people should be able to contract to use private courts to settle private disputes if they so wish.

By: Hugo S Cunningham

Hugo S Cunningham — Sun, 25 Sep 2016 15:01:18 +0000

Allen–
In other words, moot courts whose rulings have no legal/governmental effect?

By: Allan

Allan — Thu, 22 Sep 2016 13:55:58 +0000

I don’t think I suggested that courts were not part of the government. I think I suggested that the libertarian view would be that courts be private, not governmental, entities.

By: Hugo S Cunningham

Hugo S Cunningham — Thu, 22 Sep 2016 02:42:11 +0000

Allan– Are you seriously suggesting that courts, dependent on police, prisons, and other government resources to function and enforce their rulings, are not part of government?

By: Allan

Allan — Mon, 19 Sep 2016 13:22:34 +0000

What an anti-libertarian world-view. We should get government out of everything, why not out of inter-governmental relations, i.e., diplomacy? what we really need is an international tort court. But, then, countries would have to give up sovereign immunity to be liable for money damages.

By: Walter Olson

Walter Olson — Mon, 19 Sep 2016 12:15:56 +0000

Andrew Barovick is right that such lawsuits have been difficult to mount and prove, and would tax the resources of conventional law firms. This 2015 report indicates that among the firms leading the effort are Cozen O’Connor, Motley Rice, and the Simmons firm of asbestos fame. Motley Rice, forever linked to the massive tobacco settlement, has taken a very public role in the litigation for more than a decade. http://blogs.reuters.com/alison-frankel/2015/04/14/can-saudi-government-once-again-evade-suit-by-911-families/

By: Andrew Barovick

Andrew Barovick — Mon, 19 Sep 2016 11:40:48 +0000

I agree that U.S. foreign and counter-terror policy needs to be left alone, and not subjected to individual lawsuits. But I disagree with the premise that it is trial lawyers who are responsible for any threat to the sanctity of that policy. Instead, I think that there are victims of terrorist attacks, and their families, who have been devastated and want to see some justice. It is understandable that they would turn to the courts. But I don’t see any big push by trial lawyers to attract plaintiffs in such lawsuits, which must be difficult to mount and prove, and must involve a large commitment of cash. (I am happy to be proven wrong.) Life is difficult enough for trial lawyers as it is.