Political Quotes

“I rise in support of H.R. 1115, the Class Action Fairness Act, and I want to thank the chairman of the Committee on the Judiciary and the gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Goodlatte) for bringing this legislation to the floor today. It is critical that the House act on this issue. Over the past 10 years, there has been a dramatic increase in the filing of class action lawsuits in the United States. Some of these lawsuits have played a valuable role in our legal system allowing for the efficient resolution of legitimate claims where there were numerous parties involved. Unfortunately, too many class actions are frivolous and are brought about by greedy trial lawyers who are more concerned with shopping for the best venue to collect fees than with producing justice for the injured parties. We have heard about some of these examples. The Blockbuster Video case where customers got a coupon for a dollar off the next video. The court in Minnesota that gave the credit card company that was engaged in deceptive practices, those customers got some coupons, and the chance to apply for a credit card at a lower rate. The attorneys got $5.6 million there. In the Blockbuster case, we heard they split $9.25 million. The Coca Cola case, the customers got some 50-cent coupons and the lawyers split $1.5 million. Mr. Chairman, Americans love couponing. They love double couponing. They love triple couponing.”