SPRINGFIELD — If you pay enough attention to the Illinois legislature, you’ll hear “trial lawyers” mentioned again and again.
Those words are more than just a colloquialism for the Illinois Trial Lawyers Association.
The phrase has become a kind of shorthand among Republicans, signaling initiatives they think will harm the state’s business climate or ones they think are favors to the plaintiff attorneys’ group.
“You know who benefits from this change? Only the trial lawyers. This does not promote workforce safety one iota,” said then-Sen. Kirk W. Dillard, a Republican from Westmont, while blasting an ITLA-backed bill last year that made third-party companies potentially liable for injuries under the Workers’ Compensation Act.
And another instance: “It’s brought right now as a favor to the trial bar and to trial bar lawyers in the waning days of the Quinn administration as a parting gift,” said Rep. Ronald L. Sandack, a Downers Grove Republican, while arguing over another ITLA bill in December that ultimately reduced the size of Illinois civil juries from 12 members to six.
“Let’s get this passed for our good ol’ trial lawyer friends,” Rep. David Reis, a Willow Hill Republican, said facetiously later that day about a bill to remove the statute of repose on mesothelioma claims.
“We’ve asked for evidence that this is going to do any good. I would submit to this body that the evidence is there. Go to the State Board of Elections and look at the (campaign disclosure forms) this fall. … This is payback for the elections.”
All three initiatives were passed on mostly party-line votes, and Quinn signed them all.
“I think it would not be underestimating it to say they’re one of the more powerful and ubiquitous interest groups in Springfield,” Sandack said in an interview.
Sen. John G. Mulroe, a Democrat from Chicago who sponsored the civil-juror bill, described their influence a bit differently, comparing them to the business groups — such as the Illinois Chamber of Commerce and the Illinois Manufacturers Association — that ITLA often opposes.
“They have competing interests, but they’re on the same level. Like a boxing match. They’re both professionals. They’d fight each other at the same weight,” Mulroe said.
However you ascribe their power, the landscape for ITLA has changed dramatically with the ascension of Bruce Rauner to the governor’s office, the first Republican to hold the spot since 2002.
And now, after deftly controlling the fate of their legislation for years, the trial lawyers are transitioning into a new era.
The first shots were fired during Rauner’s State of the State speech in February, when he cited workers’ compensation and liability costs as reasons businesses such as Sealy Mattress Factory in Batavia and Modern Forge Co. in Blue Island were leaving for Indiana.
“Our workers’ compensation, unemployment insurance and liability costs all rank among the worst in America,” Rauner said from the House floor. “Those costs add up to far more than just numbers on an accountant’s balance sheet.”
He went on to call for a legal structure “that protects and fairly compensates those who are injured on the job” but also one that ensures “public and private employers are not overburdened by an irrational system.”
Just a bit later, he went further.
“And, in time, we should take another step towards trustworthy government by prohibiting trial lawyer donations to elected judges and move toward merit-based judicial reform as supported by the American Bar Association,” Rauner told lawmakers.
It was a not-so-subtle jab after some plaintiff firms made an effort to oust one of the Illinois Supreme Court’s Republican justices, Lloyd A. Karmeier, in the previous year’s election.
ITLA called Rauner’s proposal a “declaration of war.”
“It’s really startling to hear a sitting governor say that some particular class of people cannot participate. What’s next? Nurses can’t participate? Or firemen? Or members of a particular race or religion?” said John D. Cooney, ITLA president and a partner at Cooney & Conway, after viewing the speech in the House chamber.
“It isn’t possible that this particular governor is not aware of how unconstitutional or illegal that suggestion is.”
Though Cooney didn’t say directly that the venture capitalist’s tenure in the governor’s office would be detrimental to ITLA’s agenda, it’s clear both parties are philosophically opposed.
“It sounded like he very much wanted Illinois to be like Indiana,” Cooney said in a subsequent interview, adding later that in the Hoosier State, “they have so many things wrong.”
In early April, ITLA blanketed the Statehouse pressroom in Springfield with “fact sheets” that try to drive that point home further. The reason workers’ compensation costs are lower in Indiana, for instance, is because its wages are lower, the literature says.
The group’s pamphlets also take aim at some of the most frequent criticisms lobbed at them — mainly, that lawsuits are driving businesses to Indiana and that companies are not profitable in Illinois.
Illinois ranks below the national average in the number of claims per 1,000 workers, the literature notes. It is also home to five of the top 50 most profitable businesses in the Fortune 500, and the state’s unemployment rate is at its lowest level since May 2008.
“Despite demands for business ‘reforms’ — including ‘workers’ compensation reforms’ and/or ‘tort reform’ — it is obvious that the economy in Illinois is rebounding from the national recession,” ITLA’s fact sheet says. “The next time you hear cries of justice ‘reform’ from the usual suspects, remember it is profits, not facts or principles, that lie behind them.”
Just days later, Rauner called out trial lawyers again — this time, in front of a suburban newspaper’s editorial board — in an interview in which he also excoriated the Illinois Supreme Court for being “activist judges who want to be legislators.”
While trying to rationalize a pension-reform proposal he insisted would break the “corrupt bargain” between union leaders and politicians, he said the relationship between judges and attorneys who argue before them was similar.
“We have a system where we elect our judges, and the trial lawyers who argue cases in front of those judges give campaign cash to those judges. It's a corrupt system,” Rauner said, adding later: “You tell me if you look at who gives them the money and you decide whether there's a conflict of interest going on in the courts. You tell me. Do you think there's not?"
Cooney compared him to imprisoned former Gov. Rod Blagoejvich.
“Illinois had another governor not so long ago who showed pure contempt for the institutions of government and who vilified others to try and get his way,” a Cooney and ITLA statement said. “Is history repeating itself with a new governor skirting the rule of law and condemning our democratic system of checks and balances by castigating anybody not toeing his line?”
He concluded: “Our state cannot afford to once again become the scorched remnant of another vengeful bully."
As the legislative session hits the homestretch in late May, it’s unclear whether ITLA is gearing up for another legislative push or getting ready to play defense.
Cooney said the literature blitz was simply for informational purposes.
“I was very interested in June (when he became ITLA president) in having that information available. We always get anecdotal stories about things that are bad about the court and the justice system,” he said, adding that he wanted information “on what really occurs as opposed to what we just hear.”
In reality, it’s difficult to imagine Rauner signing any trial-lawyer initiatives into law.
At the same time, it’s difficult to imagine the Democratic super-majorities in either the House or Senate allowing Rauner and Republicans to pass any sort of workers’ compensation or tort-reform packages without serious concessions.
Surprising, last-minute deals are often the hallmark of spring legislative sessions, however.
“Do I think it’s unimaginable that the trial bar could actually promote legislation that would help civil trial procedures and make trials easier or more accessible or more inexpensive?” Sandack asked rhetorically. “I’d be thrilled if they did, and yeah, I could see legislation passing if it weren’t just in their interest.”
Cooney said one item his group is looking at is punitive damages in wrongful-death cases. He was hesitant to call ITLA’s legislative work in recent years “successful,” but he said he hoped it would stay consistent to its mission of helping victims.
“I think that ITLA’s work with whatever group, whether they’re legislators or the administration, is fairly consistent,” Cooney said. “And I would hope that it will continue to be successful and effective.”