Re: And I'm back...

I just tried sending the text of it but I keep getting a connection error 
message.  Appears the author is an editor at Huffpo.  I got to it from another 
page although I'm drawing a blank on which one.


Why haven't more Americans successfully sued  the banks that lured them into 
fraudulent mortgages, then foreclosed on  them without the required paperwork?
It could be because the civil justice system in this country is  essentially 
inaccessible to many Americans -- and when it does get  accessed, is tilted 
toward the wealthy and moneyed interests. 

That's certainly consistent with the finding of a world-wide survey  unveiled 
Thursday morning that ranks the United States lowest among 11  developed nations 
when it comes to providing access to justice to its  citizens -- and lower than 
some third-world nations in some categories.
Particularly when it comes to access to and affordability of legal  counsel in 
civil disputes, the U.S. ranks 20 out of the 35 nations  surveyed, below not 
only developed nations but also such countries as  Mexico, Croatia and the 
Dominican Republic.
The results are from the World Justice Project's  new "Rule of Law Index", which 
assesses how laws are implemented and  enforced in practice around the globe. 
Countries are rated on such  factors as whether government officials are 
accountable, whether legal  institutions protect fundamental rights, and how 
ordinary people fare in  the system. The index will expand from 35 countries to 
70 next year.
The lowest-ranking countries in this year's survey included Liberia, Kenya, 
Nigeria and Pakistan.
The U.S. didn't lead the world on any of the rule-of-law measures,  ranking near 
the bottom of the developed world on most -- including even  fundamental rights. 
But the most striking findings related to access to  justice for ordinary 
people. 

As part of its fact-finding, the organization polled 1,000 people in  New York, 
Chicago and Los Angeles, and found a significant gap between  the rich and the 
poor in terms of their use and satisfaction with the  civil courts system. 
According to a news release:
For instance, only 40% of low-income respondents who used  the court system in 
the past three years reported that the process was  fair, compared to 71% of 
wealthy respondents. This 31% gap between poor  and rich litigants in the USA is 
the widest among all developed  countries sampled. In France this gap is only 
5%, in South Korea it is  4% and in Spain it is nonexistent.
Juan Botero, the index's director, told the Huffington Post that the  U.S.'s 
poor ranking on access to justice "is a little bit surprising"  considering that 
our society is so prone to litigation, and so  fascinated by TV shows about law 
and order. But he said the index simply  quantifies what was already the 
consensus among legal experts: That  when it comes to access to justice, "the 
U.S. could do a better job,  especially with marginalized communities." 

Indeed, the index's findings are consistent with previous studies of access to 
justice by lower-income people. The Legal Services Corporation reported last 
year that state-level studies had concluded that less than one in five of  the 
legal problems experienced by low-income people are addressed with  help from 
either a private or legal-aid lawyer.
Unequal access to the legal system is also a problem that the Obama  
administration has publicly acknowledged and is trying to address. 

In March, Attorney General Eric Holder appointed prominent Harvard  Law 
Professor Larry Tribe to serve as a senior counselor in charge of a  new Access 
to Justice Initiative. His goal is to work with judges and  lawyers across the 
country to find ways to help people who cannot afford  a lawyer.
As Tribe himself put it in a June speech:
The truth is that as a nation, we face nothing short of a  justice crisis. It is 
a crisis both acute and chronic, affecting not  only the poor but the middle 
class. The situation we face is  unconscionable. It's why the President and the 
Attorney General created  the Access to Justice initiative that I am leading, 
and it's why we  won't rest until we have made measurable and sustainable 
progress, but  to make that progress and to do it across the board, we have got 
to  first acknowledge that what we do know is far outweighed by what we  don't 
know.
Botero said the index is not intended to be prescriptive. "The index  doesn't 
give you a complete recipe for action; it doesn't even give you a  full 
diagnosis. It's like a thermometer," he said.
Nevertheless, he noted that many other countries have more robust mechanisms to 
provide legal assistance to the poor. 

For instance, in many Latin American countries, law students spend  their final 
year of law school serving the poor. Or in Japan, many  disputes are adjudicated 
by administrative bodies. In the U.S., he said,  small claims court works very 
well. "However, the scope of coverage is  limited." The result: "There seems to 
be a gap in the system."
The U.S. criminal justice system received a mixed grade in the new  index, 
ranking well when it comes to guaranteeing due process of law,  but ranking last 
among developed nations on delivering impartial  justice.
How exactly does the index define access to justice? The report states:
In a nutshell, these factors measure whether regular  citizens can peacefully 
and effectively resolve their personal  grievances in accordance with generally 
accepted social norms, rather  than resorting to violence or self-help. 

>
>For civil and informal justice, this implies a service that is  affordable, 
>effective, impartial, and culturally competent. For criminal  justice, this 
>implies a system capable of investigating and  adjudicating criminal offences 
>impartially and effectively, while  ensuring that the rights of suspects and 
>victims are protected.
>Impartiality includes absence of arbitrary or irrational distinctions  based on 
>social or economic status, and other forms of bias, as well as  decisions that 
>are free of improper influence by public officials or  private interests. 
>Accessibility includes general awareness of available  remedies, availability 
>and affordability of legal advice and  representation, and absence of excessive 
>or unreasonable fees,  procedural hurdles, and other barriers to access the 
>formal dispute  resolution systems. Access to justice also requires fair and 
>effective  enforcement of the decisions.
And why is all this important? The report explains:
Establishing the rule of law is fundamental to achieving  communities of 
opportunity and equity--communities that offer  sustainable economic 
development, accountable government, and respect  for fundamental rights.

*************************Dan Froomkin is senior Washington correspondent for the 
Huffington Post. You can send him an e-mail, bookmark his page; subscribe to RSS 
feed, follow him on Twitter, friend him on Facebook, and/or become a fan and get 
e-mail alerts when he writes.

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