In Major Blow To Consumers, Supreme Court Protects Mega-Corporations From Liability

[boutons_deux]

In case it weren’t clear already, the U.S. Supreme Court hammered home Thursday morning that it will protect the rights of corporations to force arbitration over the individuals’ access to the court system at any expense.

In a 5-3 ruling with Justice Sonia Sotomayor recused, Justice Antonin Scalia eviscerated almost any opportunity small merchants have to challenge alleged monopolistic practices by American Express in their credit card agreements.

Sound familiar? Earlier this term, the court turned back on procedural grounds a lawsuit alleging monopolistic practices by Comcast. A week after that, they turned back the claims of workers to challenge employer practices as a class. And in 2011, they issued one of the worst blows to consumer rights in years when they held that consumers challenging $30 fees could not sue together as a class. In each of these cases, the court’s ruling meant that the parties will never get to argue about whether these corporations actually violated the law. And as a consequence, these corporations will never be held accountable.

With Thursday’s ruling, the court added small businesses to the list of aggrieved parties whose access to the courthouse has been foreclosed by boilerplate contracts that prohibit parties from filing their challenge as a class, or from otherwise shifting the immense cost of filing their claims individually. This time, the litigants were small businesses taking on American Express, and their lawyer was none other than conservative powerhouse Paul Clement. Clement has argued many of the major conservative court wins of the past few years, and his argument on the side of the plaintiffs were probably the last best shot individuals had to challenge the total dominance of the Federal Arbitration Act, and to argue the necessity of allowing individuals to band together with the necessary resources to go up against corporate behemoths.


http://thinkprogress.org/justice/201...to-the-courts/

VWRC/Repug SCOTUS political hacks the 99% hard and deep once again.

[boutons_deux]

Elizabeth Warren Warns That The Supreme Court Is Becoming ‘A Subsidiary’ Of The Chamber Of Commerce

Take a look at the win rate of the Chamber of Commerce. According to the Cons ution Accountability Center, the Chamber moved from a 43 percent win rate during the very conservative Berger Court to a 56 percent win rate under the very conservative Rehnquist court. And now they are at a 70 percent win rate under the Roberts Court. Follow this pro-business trend to its obvious conclusion and you will end up with a Supreme Court that’s a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Chamber of Commerce.




http://www.nationalmemo.com/elizabet...r-of-commerce/

[angrydude]

The government favors power. go figure. We should make the government bigger.

[boutons_deux]

The government favors power. go figure. We should make the government bigger.

This isn't about govt power, but the power of United Corporations of America, which has the $Bs to buy enough politicians, judges, to pack enough courts, to screw the 99%.

govt power is the only power strong enough to defend Human-Americans against Corporate-Americans. that's why America is ed and un able.

[FuzzyLumpkins]

The two notions are not mutually exclusive, boutox.