Make Laws, Not Lawsuits

In light of the lucrative settlements that many states have reached with tobacco companies, it is no surprise that the city of Chicago is seeking hundreds of millions of dollars from another societal cancer, the country's leading gun makers. The city has charged them with creating a public hazard by flooding markets with their product and by using lenient standards in distribution control. As a result, prosecutors contend, gun makers have assured that criminals have access to firearms.

This suit should spark debate about whether state-sponsored class action suits are causing the legislative branch to cede its regulatory responsibilities to the court system. In the case of tobacco litigation, states accused the cigarette makers of evading legal regulation by concealing the effects of smoking.

The case against the gun makers, on the other hand, has resulted from the absence of proper regulation rather than the evasion of it. The behavior of the firearm manufacturers, even more than cigarette companies, is immoral rather than illegal.

Of course, Chicago's prosecutors will probably argue that gun makers have contorted both law and morality. They will say that manufacturers have attempted to subvert stringent Chicago gun laws by flooding the markets in states with more lenient statutes such as Florida and Texas. Many economists who have studied gun sales believe that firearms entering those states are then taken to more heavily restricted areas such as Chicago.

But the prosecutors' case will focus on the negligent behavior of manufacturers in attempting to sell more guns than law-abiding citizens need. In other words, the city will accuse the gun makers of being aggressive capitalists in a legally recognized industry.

However, the ability of manufacturers to flood markets represents a failure of law rather than a breakdown of individual morality in the private sector. If excess production of guns creates a clear public hazard, then the government has the responsibility to impose production ceilings on manufacturers and to watch more closely the transactions of legally licensed distributors and retailers.

Of course, cracking down on the gun industry is easier to write about than to achieve. Passing meaningful gun-control legislation in American society has proved nearly impossible. Politicians who attempt to strengthen gun laws only end up strengthening their opponents' wallets. In the face of such a formidable lobby, civil law suits are the government's only option to control the flow of guns. Lawsuits allow politicians to appear tough on crime while in reality passing the buck onto the court system. They hope that targeted companies will lose large enough verdicts so that the monetary interests of manufacturers fall in line with their moral responsibilities.

But although lawsuits may be politically expedient, they can never take the place of law. Monetary victories in court do not ensure that companies will reform their immoral practices, as the tobacco companies have demonstrated.

Even if Chicago wins its case, gun makers will still weigh the costs of potential lawsuits against the costs of decreased revenues. The court system will also have difficulty determining who is to blame when criminals gain access to guns.

Even if manufacturers oversupply retailers, it is still hard to fault the makers for the poor judgment of legally licensed gun shop owners. Chicago prosecutors will need to find evidence showing that manufacturers intended to have merchants sell to straw men representing criminals.

Finally, state-sponsored class actions create unnecessary confusion for manufacturers. Whereas laws set definitive standards for all companies to follow, lawsuits create an environment of fear in which manufacturers must try to determine their own social responsibilities.

Suing companies for crimes such as over-production could cause widespread harm, especially considering America's penchant for allowing liability lawsuits to spin out of control. (Remember the woman who won $1 million from McDonald's because she spilled hot coffee on her lap while driving and then blamed it on the container?) None of us look forward to a world in which Hostess would have to make sure that the public consumed only a healthy number of Twinkies.

Of course, this exaggerated scenario may not occur. After all, guns are different from all other legally produced products in their ability to harm individuals, but the bottom line is that successful lawsuits are not adequate replacements for law, and we should not become so excited by monetary compensation that we become complacent in our pursuit of better legislation.

The city of Chicago will be successful only if its case reinvigorates the national demand for gun control legislation as the tobacco lawsuits did for non-smoking laws. To win the fight against gun makers and other apparent public threats, regulation must remain a legislative process rather than a judicial one. Alex M. Carter '00 is a history and literature concentrator in Dunster House. His column appears on alternate Mondays.