Jack Fields: “Mr. Chairman, let me, first of all, address what I almost hear as a basic assumption that the underlying piece of…”

“Mr. Chairman, let me, first of all, address what I almost hear as a basic assumption that the underlying piece of legislation is bad. This is not a bad piece of legislation. This legislation is aimed at the filing of frivolous lawsuits, and I will be glad to stipulate to my good friend from Michigan and my good friend from Massachusetts that our county and local governments do not file frivolous lawsuits. Now, having said that, the underlying piece of legislation would not apply to them in the filing of lawsuits that have merit, which we are willing to stipulate that is what they do. But why deny for 3 years the protections that we think are in this piece of legislation when frivolous lawsuits are filed? Now, having stipulated that frivolous lawsuits are not filed by governmental entities, let me create a scenario because, as the gentleman from Michigan pointed out just a moment ago, we have had some local governmental entities who have lost money. There is a fact question in each of those situations whether the money was lost on bad judgment, by someone who represents that governmental entity, or whether money was lost because of some fraudulent and intentional advice. If it was fraudulent and intentional advice, then this statute would not affect that type of cause of action.”