'Mass Action' Lawsuits Can Undermine Justice
This story raises questions about governance, accountability, and American values.
The first time you see one of those lawyer ads, it’s almost funny. Spooky music, a slow-motion pill bottle, a voice telling you to call 1-800 before something bad happens. Then you realize it’s not a joke.
New Republican Times Editorial Board
We’ve all seen the television ads with spooky music, doctors and pills, and a final appeal to call a 1-800
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New Republican Times Editorial Board
The first time you see one of those lawyer ads, it’s almost funny. Spooky music, a slow-motion pill bottle, a voice telling you to call 1-800 before something bad happens. Then you realize it’s not a joke. It’s a machine designed to turn ordinary people into plaintiffs, and it runs on something uglier than any side effect.
These “mass action” lawsuits are flooding courts with thousands of claims that might never have existed without a television producer and a marketing budget. Lawyers don’t find injured clients. They manufacture them. They chase the same drug or device, file the same boilerplate complaint, and hope a settlement lands them a fortune. Real victims get lost in the crowd. People who actually need help wait years while judges sort through stacked paperwork.
This isn’t justice. It’s ambulance chasing with a better ad buy. The legal system is supposed to protect the little guy. Instead, mass actions have become a wealth transfer machine, with trial lawyers taking a cut big enough to buy another round of commercials. Conservative states are right to push back on these schemes. Letting a few firms use courtrooms as lottery tickets makes a mockery of accountability and raises costs for everyone else. We don’t need to ban legitimate claims. We need to stop treating the courthouse like a casino.
Commentary written with AI assistance by the New Republican Times Editorial Board.