Lawsuit Abuse Reduction Act of 2015

Floor Speech

Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. Speaker, I rise in opposition to H.R. 758 the so-called ``Lawsuit Abuse Reduction Act of 2015'' or LARA.

Congress has only seven legislative days left before the government shuts down and vital programs and departments are left unfunded. We should be debating and voting on budgetary measures to make sure that the government can still function and remains open. We are here instead, discussing a bill that has been introduced every Congress since 2011. Instead of voting on ways the government will stay open so we can continue to fund vital national priorities, we are here talking about legislation that does not solve any demonstrated need.

This bill seeks to fix the problem of frivolous lawsuits by enacting a law that used to exist and which judges themselves later rejected. A mandatory sanction of Rule 11 violations was an experiment that was tried in 1983 and was dismissed and abandoned just ten years later in 1993. Almost 100 percent of federal judges surveyed by the Federal Judicial Committee state that Rule 11 should not be altered in the way this Act envisions and 86 percent of judges think the existing rule is fine as is.

This bill will increase the cost and volume of cases and make it exponentially harder to advance civil rights suits. Landmark civil rights cases such as Brown v. Board of Education, Griswold v. Connecticut, and Lawrence v. Texas would not have survived if Rule 11 existed as this bill envisions. We should not put up barriers to continuing civil rights progress through the courts.

This bill is opposed by The American Bar Association, The Federal Judicial Center and countless other legal organizations. Their voices are clear: leave Rule 11 and judicial autonomy alone. Congress does not need to ``fix'' a problem that simply does not exist.

The Judiciary Committee report says that this law would ``dispel the culture of fear that has come to permeate American society.'' American society does not fear the existing process for Rule 11 sanctions. The American public is concerned about roads not being built, about the government shutting down, and about losing their health care coverage.

The American public does not want the government to shutdown. They have been there and done that. The last government shut down costs the American people $24 billion dollars in lost economic output. That is why I introduced the Prevent a Government Shutdown Act of 2015. That is what we should be debating and voting on right now, Mr. Speaker. Not a law that was tried and rejected 22 years ago.

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