Proponents of tort reform argue that members of the Georgia State Legislature, who also actively practice law, may influence policy in favor of the trial bar at the expense of Georgia businesses and consumers.
About one in five members of the Georgia Senate—11 out 56—have law degrees and nearly all of those individuals are practicing attorneys.
Meanwhile, just over one among every eight members of the Georgia House of Representatives—24 out of 180—also have law degrees, and nearly all of them are practicing attorneys as well.
In a May 2015 article from The Journal of Law & Economics authored by Ulrich Matter and Alois Stutzer of the University of Basel, the two scholars opined that lawyers who also happen to be lawmakers will more likely vote in alignment with their personal and private interests.
“Attorneys elected to the U.S. Congress and to state legislatures are systematically less likely to vote in favor of tort reforms that restrict tort litigation, but more likely to support bills that extend tort law than are legislators with different professional background. This finding is based on the analysis of 64 roll call votes at the federal and state levels between 1995 and 2014. It holds when controlling for legislators’ ideology and is particularly strong for term-limited lawyer-legislators. The empirical regularity is consistent with the hypothesis that lawyer-legislators, at least in part, pursue their private interests when voting on tort issues.”
The American Tort Reform Association has also labeled Georgia as its leading “judicial hellhole” for 2023-2024, on a list of jurisdictions where it feels businesses do not get fair consideration in court.
Georgia was given this label, according to ATRA, due to “excessive, ‘nuclear’ verdicts, expanded premises liability and questionable decisions by the Georgia Supreme Court.”
When addressing the Georgia Chamber of Commerce last year, Gov. Brian Kemp stated that “the laws on our books make it too easy to bring frivolous lawsuits against Georgia business owners which drive up the price of insurance and stop new, good-paying jobs from ever coming to communities that need them the most.”
Georgia Senators with law degrees
Jason Esteves (D-06); Josh McLaurin (D-14); Brian Strickland (R-17); John Kennedy (R-18); Blake Tillery (R-19); Harold V. Jones II (D-22); David Lucas Sr. (D-26) [Lucas possesses a law degree, but it’s unclear if he ever practiced law]; Elena Parent (D-42); Bill Cowsert (R-46); Bo Hatchett (R-50) and John Albers (R-56) [Albers previously worked as a Chief Information Officer at the law firm of Fisher Phillips].
Georgia State Representatives with law degrees
Stan Gunter (R-08); Tyler Smith (R-18); Todd Jones (R-25) [Jones possesses a law degree, but it’s unclear if he ever practiced law]; Terry Cummings (D-39); Esther Panitch (D-51); Shea Roberts (D-52); Deborah Silcox (R-53); Stacey Evans (D-57); Tanya Miller (D-62); Scott Holcomb (D-81) [Holcomb possesses a law degree, but it’s unclear if he ever practiced law]; Mary Margaret Oliver (D-82); Omari Crawford (D-84); Saira Draper (D-90); Dar’shun Kendrick (D-95); Marvin Lim (D-98); Matt Reeves (R-99); Soo Hong (R-103); Chuck Efstration (R-104) [Efstration is a former District Attorney]; Samuel Park (D-107); Rob Leverett (R-123); Teddy Reese (D-140); Jon Burns (R-159) [Burns possesses a law degree, but it’s unclear if he ever practiced law]; Anne Westbrook (D-163); and James Burchett (R-176).