Senate Delays Class Action Reform
Thursday, June 3rd, 2004 Legislation & Regulation LitigationSenate leaders have decided to postpone consideration of a class action reform bill until they finish work on a contentious defense authorization bill. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., had originally scheduled a cloture vote to limit preliminary debate on S. 2062, the Class Action Fairness Act, for late Tuesday afternoon. The bill would, among other things, allow the transfer to federal court from state court of certain class actions involving defendants and plaintiffs from different states. But several Democratic supporters of the bill said that they would vote against cloture unless work proceeded on an unrelated defense bill. Without the support of the Democrats, the bill would fall far short of the 60 votes needed to invoke cloture and end preliminary debate.
