The Civil Justice Association of California today urged the Legislature (as it addresses health care in the coming year) to avoid being distracted by the pro-lawsuit minority advancing the personal injury lawyer agenda.

"Just as last year, the fundamental issue is making health care accessible for more Californians," said John H. Sullivan, association president. "By needlessly driving up costs, increased litigation makes that goal harder to achieve. The personal injury lawyers' fundamental goal is to eliminate the ability of consumers, employers, and businesses to agree to settle future disputes through binding arbitration instead of going to court. The bigger the prospect of a long and costly courtroom trial, the bigger the chances are to leverage a big dollar settlement from a health care provider or hit a jackpot jury verdict."

Sullivan said the anti-arbitration contingent's re-run of the old "Engalla" case involving Kaiser actually buttresses the argument against their proposal. "That case led Kaiser into a detailed study and re-design of its arbitration process. Changes have been put into effect and are getting high marks from neutral observers," he said. "Today the Engalla case is a better subject for historians than policy makers."

Items to note: Arbitration is a practice encouraged under both State and Federal law to resolve disputes and has been widely used to the benefit of consumers for decades.

• ".... the court has repeatedly made clear that arbitration may resolve statutory claims as well as those purely contractual if the parties so intend, and that in doing so, parties do not forego substantive rights, but merely agree to resolve disputes in a different forum." - Mitsubishi Motors Corp v Soler Chrysler-Plymouth, Inc. (1985) 476 U.S. 614, 627. (emphasis added)

• "Plaintiffs' lawyers who complain about arbitration are really afraid of having their best arguments and tactics seen for what they are Ü baloney. They are also afraid that their client will not initially and automatically be perceived as a victim."- Attorney Alan S. Levins, "Only Claims Without Merit Benefit From Jury System Inefficiencies," San Francisco Daily Journal, September 28, 1999.

• "Over the past 15 years, the United States Supreme Court has on numerous occasions invalidated laws and judicial decisions that disfavored arbitration." - Cigna v Broughton, California Supreme Court 12/02/1999.(emphasis added)

• "A reputable vendor or service provider does not regard itself as being in the litigation business, yet any high-volume enterprise will generate some consumer dissatisfaction, and it will be good business to provide for quick, economical and fair resolution of disputes, as by arbitration." -Winslow Christian, retired California Court of Appeal justice, in California Law Business.