Lawyers to the left of me, hypocrites to the right Americans love to loathe lawyers: The wretched mass of Armani-wearing, BMW-driving men and women searching for a harmed or otherwise offended person and the punitive damages that go with them. Those evil vultures hiding in the shadows of hospitals just waiting to use terms like "therewith," "hereto" and "estoppel." As a result, states and the U.S. government have begun a process of tort reform designed to cut the incentives to sue by reducing available damages and restricting the money-making large class-action suits. Conservatives have jumped on the bandwagon, and more than a few times recently, members of the GOP have claimed that the courthouse doors should be closed to some of the aggrieved. They see lawsuits against the tobacco industry and Microsoft as a means to punish companies for being successful. There is a lot of merit to tort reform. Americans are incredibly litigious - in 1998, 256,787 new lawsuits found their way into U.S. District courts alone, according to the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts. Many suits are filed simply to draw a quick settlement because plaintiffs know their cases won't survive a judge and jury's wrath. And some lawsuits are just stupid - Amazon.com sued (and won an injunction against) BarnesandNoble.com for infringing their patented one-click book-ordering method. Now B&N users have to - gasp - double click. Now there's a brilliant, unique idea that needed legal protection. But the type of lawsuit that really gets the blood boiling are those that try to alter something significant in the constitutional or social order. After Brown v. the Board of Education, some states decided the Supreme Court was so wrong that they could nullify their decision. The Warren Court, and to a lesser extent the Burger Court, were decried as anti-democratic when they found many of the rights our generation takes for granted. But now the tide has turned, and conservatives find themselves on the plaintiffs' end of lawsuits. It would seem that conservatives have got the upper hand using a tool they claim is abused by trial lawyers. From campaign finance to civil rights, courts have been making some serious rightist inroads lately at the behest of conservative groups. Many conservatives complain about the rich trial lawyer lobby that hates them so while at the same time supporting some of the legal machinations conservative judges have made in recent years. For example, George W. Bush, a man who insists his would-be judicial appointees would not use the bench to legislate, has lauded a recent string of Supreme Court decisions that has seen the court acting more activist than it has for years. Similarly, while he brags about cutting junk lawsuits back in Texas, he has filed a legal complaint with the Federal Elections Commission against a Website critical of him (www.gwbush.com), saying that "there ought to be limits to freedom." Poor thing, he got his little feelings hurt and now he wants the man with the gavel to fix it. John McCain is suing the New York Republican Party over its idiotic primary scheme. Steve Forbes recently threw a catty little lawsuit GW's way, alleging that some of the signatures that got the latter on the New York ballot were duplicates. The only question remaining is why the trial lawyer lobby isn't dumping money on the Elephants. Granted, the ACLU is still fighting its way through the courts, but with federal judiciary stacked as it is and Orrin Hatch sitting on his hands in the Senate Judiciary Committee, there is little hope for another liberal legal revolution like the one America experienced in the '50s, '60s and '70s. The Supreme Court, staffed with several Republican appointees put there to end the judicial legislation of courts past, has been giving the term "judicial activism" new meaning. In light of the gridlock between the still-scraping-the-egg-off-its-face White House and the couldn't-get-something-done-if-it-had-to Congress, the Court has seized the political opportunity and has been redefining what the United States is. Among their stellar achievements include blanket immunity for organs of the states from age (and perhaps other) discrimination cases because the justices decided there was insufficient evidence of such bias. It has also decided that many federal laws requiring states to act in a certain way are invalid. In "The Moral Basis of a Free Society," Forbes has described the Warren Court as spawning "a proliferation of increasingly bizarre lawsuits" and creating "a judiciary that often acts like an imperial aristocracy hurtling decrees down on the rest of us." Indeed. Oh, Mr. Forbes, your legal team is on line two. - When Jack Schillaci is a federal judge, he will make being George W. Bush unconstitutional. He can be reached over e-mail at jschilla@umich.edu. Jack Schillaci Slam It to the Left Originally on page 4A in the 1-31-2000 issue of the Daily.