Orrin Hatch: “With all of this said, is it credible to suggest that the Judicial Conference, much less the Chief Justice of the United…”

“With all of this said, is it credible to suggest that the Judicial Conference, much less the Chief Justice of the United States, stands somehow opposed to the class action bill? I think not. I will refer to this ``myth'' chart. The myth is that the Federal Judicial Conference opposes the Class Action Fairness Act. These are the facts: The Conference's opposition was directed at class action bills in previous Congresses. In March 2003, the Conference strongly criticized the current class action system and suggested several areas to modify the Class Action Fairness Act. After the Class Action Fairness Act was modified during markup, the Conference declined an invitation to criticize or revise the version favorably reported by the Judiciary Committee and thanked the Senate for its efforts to clean up the State court class action mess. That certainly rebuts everything that was said on the floor yesterday and today by those who are looking for any excuse they can to scuttle this bill. Unfortunately, some of them are people who have agreed to support the bill. That seems apparent to me. I hope it is apparent to all of those in the various States who have relied on these agreements, and at least this agreement made last November, that we would at least vote for cloture. That was the whole issue.…”