Suing the Tobacco and Lead Pigment Industries

by Gifford, Donald G.

• ISBN13: 9780472117147
• ISBN10: 0472117149
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2010-04-05
• Publisher: Univ of Michigan Pr

Summary

"The topic, how tort law evolved over time into a system that allowed, for a moment at least, a parens patriae form of massive litigation against corporations, is exceedingly interesting and important. Gifford's treatment of this topic is highly informative, engaging, insightful, very current, and wise." ---David Owen, Carolina Distinguished Professor of Law, and Director of Tort Law Studies, University of South Carolina InSuing the Tobacco and Lead Pigment Industries, legal scholar Donald G. Gifford recounts the transformation of tort litigation in response to the challenge posed by victims of 21st-century public health crises who seek compensation from the product manufacturers. Class action litigation promised a strategy for documenting collective harm, but an increasingly conservative judicial and political climate limited this strategy. Then, in 1995, Mississippi attorney general Mike Moore initiated aparens patriaeaction on behalf of the state against cigarette manufacturers. Forty-five other states soon filed public product liability actions, seeking both compensation for the funds spent on public health crises and the regulation of harmful products. Gifford finds that courts, through their refusal to expand traditional tort claims, have resisted litigation as a solution to product-caused public health problems. Even if the government were to prevail, the remedy in such litigation is unlikely to be effective. Gifford warns, furthermore, that by shifting the powers to regulate products and to remediate public health problems from the legislature to the state attorney general,parens patriaelitigation raises concerns about the appropriate allocation of powers among the branches of government. Donald G. Gifford is the Edward M. Robertson Research Professor of Law at the University of Maryland School of Law.

Table of Contents

Introduction	p. 1
The Tort System's Early Responses To Product-Caused Diseases
The Morning after the Consumer Century	p. 13
Product-Caused Diseases Confront the Law of the Iron Horse	p. 32
The First Wave of Challenges to the Individual Causation Requirement	p. 54
Public Products Litigation as a Response to Regulatory Failure
The Seeds of Government-Sponsored Litigation	p. 83
A Failure of Democratic Processes? Legislative Responses to the Public Health Problems Caused by Tobacco and Lead Pigment	p. 104
The Government as Plaintiff: Parens Patriae Actions against Tobacco and Gun Manufacturers	p. 120
Judicial Rejection of Recovery for Collective Harm: Public Nuisance and the Rhode Island Paint Litigation	p. 138
A Critique of Public Products Litigation
Do Litigation Remedies Cure Product-Caused Public Health Problems?	p. 171
Impersonating the Legislature: State Attorneys General and Parens Patriae Products Litigation	p. 192
Conclusion	p. 215
Notes	p. 231
Selected Bibliography	p. 281
Index	p. 299
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