People have been placing each other at risk through negligence since human history began, yet modern personal injury law is relatively recent.
Personal injury lawyers often get known by the nickname of being “ambulance chasers,” yet their work is crucially important. Much of what personal injury lawyers use today comes from important court cases from which these concepts were first established.
Common Law
Personal injury law as we understand it today only began emerging more recently. Although legal systems and their practices have existed since ancient times when moral codes acted as moral guides, personal injury cases as we know them today only began taking off in the 1970s when lawyers started advertising their services on TV and using terms like “ambulance chaser” to describe attorneys pursuing frivolous lawsuits.
Still, the concept of compensating individuals injured due to others dates back centuries. Both the Babylonian Code of Hammurabi and Roman law established compensation as an obligation owed by those who wrong another; common law–an idea brought over from England with colonists–is at the core of modern American legal systems which rely more heavily on precedent than statutes passed by lawmakers–offers more flexible ways of settling claims than its counterparts.
Personal injury cases date back to the 1600s when Donoghue v Stevenson established negligence laws within modern tort law. This case established proximate cause law which states that an injury must have directly resulted from its cause.
Other cases followed that illustrated basic principles of negligence and liability, including that of a man injured when kicking an animal in self-defense; and another woman suffering severe burns after her boyfriend dropped an unlit candle onto her.
The Industrial Revolution gave birth to modern-day personal injury law. Additionally, worker’s compensation insurance was created as a means to cover medical expenses and lost wages after work-related accidents that would otherwise not be covered by employers – creating more regulated employee-employer relations that laid the foundation for modern day personal injury laws.
Strict Liability
Strict liability is a legal doctrine which holds defendants liable for an act or tort regardless of intent and mental state, both criminally and civilly. Strict liability applies both criminally (such as possession crimes and statutory rape) as well as tortuously in tort cases such as defective products and abnormally hazardous activities or conditions.
When a plaintiff files a strict liability claim, the court must establish that their actions or lack thereof caused injury to them – this differs from negligence cases wherein plaintiff must demonstrate that defendant exhibited any type of negligent behavior that fit a specific category. Furthermore, courts must ascertain if defendant knew about risks involved with their activity/condition and assumed those risks willingly.
Defense strategies against strict liability claims for defendants may include assumption of risk, the statute of limitations and/or federal preemption. A court may also find that activity or condition was necessary and unreasonably dangerous in its role within their business activities, in addition to noting negligence on part of either themselves or the plaintiff in contributing to injuries/damages through using or misusing products/activities provided.
Scholars generally reject strict liability due to its potential unfairness; however, it still serves a deterrent function and can help avoid irresponsible behavior or needless losses.
Mining companies frequently utilize explosives in their business operations; should these explosives cause harm to anyone, they could face strict liability. This applies equally for any ultrahazardous activities which are part of doing business.
Pharmaceutical industries can also be sued for producing defective products, with claims often including manufacturing flaws as well as design or marketing faults. If you or a loved one has been injured by one of these defective products, an experienced personal injury attorney can assist in choosing the best legal strategy to take.
Industrial Revolution
As the Industrial Revolution transitioned into the 1920s, personal injury claims rose rapidly. Miners, railroad workers and factory employees often faced dangerous working conditions that resulted in serious injuries that sometimes led to fatalities; as a result, laws were created which permitted lawsuits against companies for worker’s compensation as well as personal injury claims.
At this point, the non-profit Association of Personal Injury Lawyers was founded to enhance services for accident victims. Furthermore, this decade witnessed an explosion of car accidents and negligence cases, prompting more personal injury suits being filed than ever. With these developments came proximate cause; an established legal principle which states that accidents or injuries must be linked directly back to actions taken by defendants.
One of the most infamous personal injury claims to arise during this decade involved Stella Liebeck, then aged 79 years, who was awarded $2.9 million after spilling McDonald’s coffee on herself and experiencing third-degree burns over six percent of her body resulting from spillage. Critics would later use her case as an example of frivolous lawsuits.
The 1920s also marked a new era with the advent of cars in America, leading to increased traffic incidents and fatalities – Capital University Law Review estimated there were over 30,000 traffic fatalities alone between 1930-1933, prompting many personal injury suits and awards of damages for pain and suffering being awarded as compensation.
Donoghue vs Stevenson was the case that laid the groundwork for modern concepts of duty of care, product liability and negligence generally. For the first time ever in American law courts recognized manufacturers and producers owed a duty of care and legal responsibility in making products safe for consumers – this difference being one between English common law and American legal precedent which both depend upon legal precedent rather than an actual legislative body for law-making processes.
20th Century
Personal injury law has its origins deep within history. Compensation for injuries was first codified under various legal codes such as Hammurabi’s Code or Roman law’s Twelve Tables; these ancient documents recognized an individual’s right to sue anyone who harms another, as well as providing guidelines for awarding damages according to specific criteria.
As the Industrial Revolution transitioned into the 20th century, accidents and injuries rose significantly worldwide. Mine workers, railroad employees and factory employees all faced long hours, dangerous machinery and little oversight that caused hundreds of deaths and serious injuries each year. Furthermore, wealthy factory owners would regularly win lawsuits against injured workers which left working class people little chance for justice through court systems.
This period marked the beginning of what would come to be known as an “ambulance chaser,” which today refers to attorneys who seek out clients who have been injured. Furthermore, personal injury law made advances such as laws permitting workers to file claims against companies if they were injured on the job and worker’s compensation laws that still exist today.
Prior to the 1930s, personal injury cases weren’t as prominently discussed; however, Donoghue v Stevenson brought personal injury law into public awareness. May Donoghue had drunk ginger beer containing decomposed snail remains and experienced shock and gastroenteritis as a result; she sued its manufacturer claiming negligence on his part.
Before this case, the requirements for filing a lawsuit were stringent: injuries had to be both substantial and clearly caused by another party. This lawsuit and others like it laid the groundwork for modern personal injury law, which centers around the idea that negligent conduct should be penalized and that legal concept of “proximate cause.” This period also marked the origin of modern personal injury law.