Illinois Business Journal Illinois Business Journal
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Is Madison County the 'judicial hellhole' that tort reformers claim?
By ALAN J. ORTBALS
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   EDWARDSVILLE - When advocates of tort reform delivered their Madison County Manifesto a year ago, they touched off a controversy that swept through the medical malpractice insurance crisis this year - one that is now playing itself out in the campaign for a seat on the Illinois Supreme Court.
   The American Tort Reform Association later published its "Bringing Justice to Judicial Hellholes 2003" report that targeted Madison County, Ill. as the No. 1 "judicial hellhole" in the country.
   This designation was based upon a poll of ATRA members and others

Chief Executive Officer, Thomas J. Donohue

U.S. Chamber of Commerce President and Chief Executive Officer Thomas J. Donohue denounces Madison County's imbalanced legal environment while Illinois Civil Justice League President Ed Murnane looks on.
in the business community, according to Sherman Joyce, president of ATRA.
   "The system is one sided," he said. "The system has produced outrageous results and defendants, who when they find themselves being subject to the judicial [continue]
 
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Congress, Illinois draft bills to decide when class action cases go to fed court
By KERRY L. SMITH

   The question of whether class action lawsuits should remain in state courts or be propelled to the federal court system is a topic the 108th Congress is preparing to debate.
   Introduced by the U.S. Senate in June 2003, the Class Action Fairness Act, approved in the U.S. House as HR 1115 three months earlier, never made it past the Senate Rules Committee.
   The U.S. Chamber of Commerce's Institute for Legal Reform is hoping that will change, once Congress passes its U.S. Department of Defense spending authorization legislation

Illinois class action cases Illinois class action cases

and reexamines a compromise version of the federal Class Action Fairness Act, now known as SB 2062.
   The essence of the legislation is this: A national class action lawsuit would be required to move from state court to federal court if [continue]

Illinois class action cases

Above, attorneys representing Philip Morris confer during a closed door session in April 2003 in Circuit Court Judge Nicholas Byron's Madison County courtroom. Under SB 1158 - the state's proposed version of a class action fairness bill - some cases would have to be heard in Chicago's Cook County because that is the county in which the largest number of plaintiffs reside.

As graph at right indicates, class action filings have skyrocketed in Madison County since 1995. Graph by Steve Weber		 class action lawsuit chart