PROTECT CONSUMER JUSTICE.ORG

San Francisco Chronicle: Vanderbilt Law School professor Brian Fitzpatrick writes, “If people don’t sue, businesses know they can cheat people out of small amounts with impunity. Class actions band individuals together so businesses cannot escape accountability.”

Los Angeles Times: Columnist David Lazarus previews a case that will be heard by the U.S. Supreme Court on November 9, in which such businesses as credit card issuers, cell phone providers and cable TV companies want the ability to bar consumers from filing class-action lawsuits.

When Mohamed Ali Samantar came to the United States from war-torn Somalia in 1997, he hoped to live quietly in retirement in suburban Virginia. But thanks to a little-known San Francisco human rights group, the former Somali official instead became the focus of a landmark U.S. Supreme Court human rights case.

New York Times editorial: “Businesses love these provisions, because arbitrators act quickly and almost always rule in their favor.”

“Limiting the legal and financial responsibility of corporate wrongdoers is a bad idea in the best of times. But in times like these–when corporate malfeasance is waxing and government oversight is waning–it is almost unthinkable.”

In times like these, when job applications come in by the reams for single openings, forcing new hires to forgo legal rights for the sake of a paycheck is just plain coercive. And wrong.

National Law Journal: The court’s ruling in Rent-A-Center, West v. Jackson “greatly limits the ability of consumers and employees to challenge the fairness of arbitration agreements.”