In 1992 , a 78 - year - old cleaning lady spilled a worst hot cupful of McDonald ’s deep brown in her lap while sit in a parked elevator car . After endure serious third degree burns , she won a lawsuit against the fast - nutrient chain of mountains for almost $ 3 million ( the amount she in reality pick up , however , might have beenmuch less ) . Since then , the lawsuithas become something of a parable for the U.S. ’s lawsuit - happy acculturation . Should n’t people know that coffee is choke to be hot ?
TheAmerican Museum of Tort Law , founded by five - clock time presidential prospect Ralph Nader , aims to show that lawsuits likeLiebeck v. McDonald ’s Restaurantsare far from frivolous . Rather , it ’s an implemental way to hold corporations accountable . Nader launch the museum in his hometown , Winsted , Conn. , with a former personal wound attorney . After 17 age of planning and fundraising , it open up on September 27 .
The museum ’s first exhibit centering on lawsuits like the McDonald ’s coffee case , a 1981 lawsuit over the Ford Pinto ’s inclination to explode in chance event , and a 1949 Supreme Court decision deemed “ the crashing rat case . ” It also admit an display on Nader ’s struggle with Chevrolet , the company he took to labor inUnsafe at Any Speed , his 1965 Holy Scripture about car maker ’ disinclination to implement safety design feature .
The museum demo a different persuasion of causa than the one often held in the public imagination . It argues that personal accidental injury lawsuits can be a creature for the public commodity . “ You know , people do n’t see the welfare of civil wrong jurisprudence . Their machine are safe . Their nutrient are dependable . They just live in an improved world , ” museum co - founder Richard Newman told theNew Yorker .
[ h / t : The New Yorker ]
