It's Duck Season: Public's Safety Under the Gun

Duck-hunting season doesn't open until October in most parts of the country. But in the nation's capital, it apparently goes on all year.

Consumers across the country must feel like sitting ducks, watching, waiting for the next shot to be fired by a conservative congressman as anti-consumer legislation is introduced in rapid fire. Local governments, accountants, architects, even lawyers are being spared the consequences of their negligence in this flurry of federal legislation.

And now the latest assault limitation on recovery for railroad crash victims. Is there no end in sight? Do defense-oriented legislators never sleep?

Open season has been declared on consumer groups in the name of trial lawyer disdain. But a closer look at these efforts reveals that the so-called reform is quackery.

The latest skullduggery comes from lame-duck Sen. John C. Danforth, R-Mo. He has introduced a bill that could immunize railroad companies from all liability for injuries that occur in accidents at grade crossings. It is ludicrous to think that intelligent elected officials could ignore uncontradicted statistics gathered by the U.S. Department of Transportation-4,910 grade crossings collisions in 1992 which left 1,975 people injured and 579 dead. In the Chicago area, for example, more than a dozen people have been killed in the last few weeks at various railroad crossings.

With such a record, just about any other product would be recalled. Instead, Senator Danforth tries to reward a $30 billion business which spends a mere fraction of that on safety improvements, according to statistics from the Association of American Railroads. All this is particularly frightening in view of the fact that there are more than 220,000 grade crossings in this country with no warnings or with "passive" devices such as warning signs or painted pavement.

Whether the warning system at each grade crossing was reasonably safe or whether the injured person on the highway exercised reasonable caution under the circumstances are questions of fact for a jury to decide. Traffic engineering and design, signage, speed, braking and a host of other factors all come into play.

A law cannot just declare a grade crossing safe or a railroad immune as a matter of law and leave a maimed driver, bicyclist or pedestrian without any hope for recovery.

Tort ÔReform'

Products liability legislation that proposes to limit recoverable pain and suffering negligently caused by a company's product is another area "reformers" are squawking about.

Products liability lawsuits are not hampering new product initiatives, as manufacturers would have everyone believe. Rather, legislation intended to combat such suits would encourage negligent conduct, allowing untested products to cause all sorts of harm, without recourse, while profits continue to pour into the wrongdoers' hands. Nor do products liability claims have an impact on the insurance market because insurance premiums account for less than 1 percent of American business' gross receipts. Such costs do not threaten the viability of American business or the cost of goods and services.

Take, for instance, the airline industry. Its lobbyists pushed a bill through Congress, the General Aviation Revitalization Act, that would cut off recovery for anyone injured in an aircraft that has been in the air for 18 years or more and that seats 20 or fewer people. The industry claims such limitations are necessary to revitalize the manufacture of small airplanes.

Yet Textron, the parent company of Cessna, a major aircraft manufacturer, boasts in its 1993 shareholders report that revenues were up 21 percent in 1992 and another 31 percent in 1993. It tells its shareholders, "The benefits from Textron's 1992 acquisition of Cessna are expected to increase with the anticipated growth of the business jet air market for the remainder of this decade." Sufferin' succotash, as Daffy Duck would say.

Skewed View

In the area of health care reform, the insurance and medical lobbies would have one think we are all "dead in the water" without tort reform. They have yet to address the uncontradicted fact that medical malpractice premiums account for less than 1 percent of the $838 billion health care bill. What is apparent beneath all of this "reform" is the greed of some sectors of American business. Each bill, in reality, attempts to quantify the unknown for the negligent, even reckless wrongdoer, who then can live without fear of legal restraint.

Companies spend millions of dollars each year in an effort to determine and project losses. The limits of the harm that is a dangerous product can cause are difficult to budget into a company's yearly statements. The proposed legislation minimizes corporate risk and allows big business to put a price tag on allowing faulty products into the marketplace. Is it fair for corporate defendants to become richer at the expense of innocently injured consumers?

Who is behind this selfish plot? It is obvious: big business, manufacturers, the medical lobby, the insurance industry and now the railroads. A bunch of quacks.