The problems with the system are legion: Allowing "scorched earth" adversarial procedures such as interminable pre-trial discovery, where basically any and all documents of a party can be requisitioned, irrespective of relevance; Expansion of class-action suit admissibility, which benefits only the lawyers in each case; The filing of cases on very vague charges, with lawyers tagging on more definite charges based on what is unearthed during discovery or the hearing; Dragging any peripherally-involved parties into the case as co-defendants, in effect blackmailing them for settlements; "Shopping" for courts to find the one where a plaintiff has the most chance to succeed; and so forth and so forth.

Of most concern is the drift away from the Rule of Law these changes constitute: Invasion of privacy; Being dragged into a court of law not knowing exactly what you are accused of; Jurisdiction of courts becoming meaningless; Law being arbitrarily applied, resulting in a punishment not based on your crime, but on how much you can afford to pay; and the admission of evidence irrelevant to the case, but potentially damaging in a sympathetic jury's eyes. And one has little recourse to the Constitution for protection from all this, as it mostly provides for protection against abuse from the state, not abuse from you neighbors or lawyers.

The faults of the system levy costs on everyone, even if you never actually get involved in a suit. Insurance premiums of all kinds skyrocket; Useful products or services never make it onto the market, or are withdrawn; Products and services become more expensive; Workers lose jobs when businesses are damaged by suits.

Mr. Olson proposes several remedies that will help fix the system. The most important, enshrined in law over most of the rest of the world, is that the loser of a suit should pay the opposing party's legal fees. This is a very sensible solution that would get rid of a lot of the abuses engendered by the lawyer's financial interest in the outcome of the suit. Of course the lawyer lobby will fight tooth and nail to prevent this.

To conclude, a very important book, which should be read by al Americans interested in further improving their society.

As I predicted in an editorial in the April 1993 issue of the Journal of the Medical Association of Georgia, "On the Liability Crisis and the Glut of Litigators," the rate of litigation and the adversarial legal system has intensified with the presidency of Bill Clinton, who we know has the trial lawyers as his greatest campaign finance supporters. The litigation industry's proclivity to generate business for itself has been given a boost with his presidency, or rather co-presidency with attorney Hillary Clinton, and medical litigation has been no exception. Today, the attorney-litigators in collusion with an authoritarian public health establishment have targeted tobacco products and gun manufacturers, and have set their sights on HMOs and in the not-to-distant future, the fast food industry and nutritional products, particularly those that are considered more caloric than others and unhealthy by the coming new health police. These legal precedents are negating citizens their personal responsibility and their autonomy by blaming all their ills and afflictions on the acts of others, changing societal values in the process, and costing society billions of dollars.

This book does not deprecate honest attorneys who perform legal work necessary to adjudicate justice (e.g. criminal law), or who do the legal work necessary for the everyday business affairs of society: execute the required transactions in business deals, negotiate contracts, draw wills, carry out corporate work, serve in advisory or managerial capacity as general counsels and perform other non-trial work. What Mr. Olson denounces are those "wheel-of-fortune" and "lottery litigators" who aggressively participate in "the sue-for-profit litigation industry" for their own vested financial interest. As the author persuasively demonstrates these swashbuckling litigators are causing untold harm to the country and are unraveling the fabric of our nation.

What does Mr. Olson propose to thwart the litigation juggernaut? First, structured contingency fees should be implemented with a sliding fee-cap whereby fees diminish as awards increase; or even better, contingency fees should be eliminated. Most authorities agree that the unrestricted contingency fee is one of the greatest sources of grist for the sue-for-profit litigation mill.

For those who would drum up litigation, the "lawyers' contingency fee is like the battery in the Energizer bunny." It did not become legal in most of the United States until the 1960s. The practice is considered unethical and remains illegal in most other industrialized Western countries, because it is widely recognized that it encourages lawsuits and leads the plaintiff's attorney to overplay their client's hand in court.

Second, and most significantly, the author correctly asserts that we should strive nationally for adoption of the English Rule, which he calls "full two-way fee-shifting." By this rule, the losing side in litigation pays the court costs and all attorney's fees. This principle is not new. It is rooted firmly in Roman as well as Anglo-Saxon law. It has been and remains the rule in Great Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Switzerland, and other countries whose legal systems derive from the Anglo-Saxon common law and the Roman civil law models.

This full two-way fee-shifting is, according to Olson, "the single most important and constructive legal reform that ordinary citizens can fight for over the long term. It is memorably simple and fair, and not easily subverted once put into effect. It may also be the only reform that could render tolerable today's procedural system of push-button litigation on demand, if that system is the one we want to keep....It's the heavily contingent, unlikely-to-succeed wildcat litigators who would be discouraged by fee-shifting. And they are precisely the ones who should have been driven from the courthouse....By the horror with which they react to full fee-shifting, we will get a good idea of their sincerity."

This book should be read by all Americans concerned with the litigation explosion, not only to protect our pocketbooks, but also to preserve our personal responsibilities which come with what remains of our individual liberties.

Miguel A. Faria, Jr., M.D., Editor-in-Chief of the Medical Sentinel of the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS) and author of Medical Warrior: Fighting Corporate Socialized Medicine...

Mr. Olson obviously has legal training and mostly gets the law right. I think the main flaw in his premise is just that it's not really reasonable or fair to expect the plaintiffs' bar to be better than the society they operate in. Sure they are crazed with greed and self-aggrandizing fantasies, but so are a lot of people. My point is, they are really a symptom of the society more than anything else. The real solution is to try to encourage the public to develop a better understanding of what the law is supposed to do. I don't think ad hoc legislative interventions like the Class Action Fairness Act are the answer. I worked for a district court and I can tell you that reports about overcrowded federal dockets are very true. Unless people like Mr. Olson want to shell out extra taxes to appoint new federal judges and support staff, the likely result of the CAFA is just going to be to bring the work of the federal courts to a total halt (and I'm not exaggerating, it's well-documented how enactment of the Reconstruction Era civil rights statutes drowned the federal courts in lawsuits for decades). Actually, this is the reason that the Federal Judicial Conference and Chief Justice Rehnquist support the outright abolition of diversity jurisdiction--it's too much of a burden on the limited resources of the federal courts.

Anyway, to conclude, I thought the book was pretty good. The class action device probably does have a role to play in our law (hey, it's been around for centuries), but currently things have gotten very much out of hand (that's trite, but it's late). I tend to think that federalizing class actions is not the answer. The resolution of the problem of the entrepreneurial plaintiffs' bar probably can't come until there is some serious effort made to try to interest the public in our democratic institutions.

Mr. Olson "tells it like it is," citing a mountain of well-researched facts and anecdotes, and he builds his case with the reader relentlessly. The author demolishes the myths that the trial lawyers' bar would have us believe, and explains why the system is out of control. Concludes he, "Year upon year we do nothing to govern our elite litigators, and the result at length is that they have decided to govern us." The ultimate victims are the taxpayers and the integrity of the legislative and judicial system.

This book should be required reading of every legislator and judge, both federal and state, as well as by every well-informed American, whether of conservative, liberal, moderate or agnostic bent. I rarely write book reviews for posting on www.Amazon.com, but this book was extraordinarily good.

First, a disclaimer: I only read the first two-thirds of the book.

Excuse Factory's cover presents it as reporting the impact of the new laws, but in fact it merely argues the case against them, and ignores impact that is positive. In particular, Olson totally ignores the enormous financial and emotional cost to a grievant attempting to obtain his or her rights under these laws. For example, those familiar with the U. S. Postal Service's handling of those laws will notice the absence of any mention of major procedural hurtles such as years-long backlogs and the resultant opportunities such obstacles have given violators to ignore such laws with impunity.

I did up the rating of this to a 3 because Excuse Factor documents the unintended consequences of some laws. For example, Olson makes a good case that age discrimination laws have caused buyouts which have caused potential retirees uncertainty about when to retire, because to retire at the wrong time means missing a lucrative buyout.

In summary, I agree with "whhatlaw@ix.netcom.com, 6/25/97's" assessment, below.

The author goes takes an indepth look at several laws like the American with Disabilities Act and gives countless examples of how these laws may not necessarily be accomplishing their original purpose.

Having recently started a small business, and wanting to be proactive in understanding the law, I decided to learn all the laws that apply to me as a small business owner. I have been completely overwhelmed by how many laws there are and how difficult it is to fully understand or correctly interpret their implications. After two years of slowly getting up to speed by reading books by publishers like Nolo (that offer excellent interpretations of various laws), I was thoroughly fascinated by The Excuse Factory. It is like reading a book with several short stories except these are real life stories of the history behind these laws and the cases that resulted in the current state of the laws.

The writing style of the author keeps the reader engrossed in the book. There is a sense of drama throughout the book and going through the book can be an emotional roller coaster ride. Fortunately, the various chapters in the book can be read independently without losing the gist of what the author is trying to communicate. So, you can read the book in several sessions spread out over time based on how much of the roller coaster ride you can take on any given day.

Though at first glance it may seem like the author is against these new laws, after digging deep into the book it becomes clear that the author is fairly objective in capturing both sides of the story. The author is just trying to present to the reader the way things are right now. These laws were instituted to provide justice and fairness. But those are difficult ideals to achieve and the downside of these laws could be a result of that difficulty. Hopefully over time, these laws will self-correct (as a result of public intervention, of course). I definitely plan on reading the author's other books and am eagerly looking forward to the experience. He has a sharp insight and is not afraid to state his opinions. I can't wait to see what other aspects of the legal system he tackles next. Enjoy reading this legal drama!

They have all of these laws designed to protect workers from discrimination. It takes years, over 3 in my case, to get an EEOC administrative jusge to hear your case, and after it is all said and done, the agency doesn't have to accept the administrative judge's decision.

Now who is being abused???????