John Hope Bryant: “Mr. Chairman, ladies and gentlemen, I do not think there is anything that more highlights the real purpose of this…”

“Mr. Chairman, ladies and gentlemen, I do not think there is anything that more highlights the real purpose of this legislation more than the refusal of the gentleman from California [Mr. Cox] and the gentleman from Texas [Mr. Fields] and others to go along with this amendment. All this amendment says is that the very harsh new standards for winning one of these cases are not going to apply in the future, will not be made to apply for the next 3 years to cities and to public institutions. This bill was brought to us because the other side told us, without any evidence, by the way, but told us there were a bunch of greedy lawyers out there and a bunch of greedy professional plaintiffs and all of them got together and would file these strike suits, making life miserable for people in business who need to raise capital. Well, assuming that that is correct, they never did tell us that the cities and towns of the country and the counties of this country and the universities and public institutions of this country were involved in that kind of behavior. In fact, everybody knows they are not.”