WASHINGTON--A Democratic compromise class-action reform initiative is a "poison pill" that will undercut real reform, according to the one of the sponsors of a bipartisan Senate class-action bill.
Sen. John Breaux, D-La., has been circulating his version of class-action reform as a substitute to the bipartisan measure approved by the Senate Judiciary Committee in April.
The earlier, bipartisan bill--S. 274, the Class Action Fairness Act--would permit the relocation of certain interstate class-action lawsuits to federal from state courts at the request of either plaintiffs or defendants, provided that at least $5 million were at stake.
The Breaux substitute, however, would give only plaintiffs the option of shifting a case to federal court and is silent on a dollar threshold. Only in cases where one-third or less of the class members are citizens of the state in which the original action was filed would a federal court automatically have jurisdiction under the Breaux bill.
Speaking Monday afternoon at a conference on legal reform sponsored by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce's Institute for Legal Reform, one of S. 274's original sponsors--Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa--condemned the Breaux substitute as a "poison pill" that would doom class-action reform efforts. He urged his audience to oppose it.
Class-action reform advocates have long held that removing class actions that involve defendants and plaintiffs from multiple states to federal court from state courts would provide more fairness than the current system of trying such cases in state courts.
Sen. Grassley said the full Senate would probably take up S. 274 after it returns from a short recess in early October.
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