WASHINGTON — There's love of apple pie and baseball, but nothing bespeaks America quite like its long affair with hamburgers and guns.

Worried that Americans' flirting with litigation is jilting purveyors of bullets and burgers, Rep. Chris Cannon, R-Utah, is co-sponsoring separate legislation to protect fast-food companies and gun manufacturers from being sued for what they sell.

"The American people have the right to choose what they eat, and I hope they eat well, but if they choose to eat a burger they should not have to pay for the burger and a litigation tax on top of that," Cannon said.

The two bills, up for a full Judiciary Committee vote today, are in a package of litigation reform measures that have already been passed by or are working their way through Congress. Lawmakers have already approved medical malpractice and class-action lawsuit reforms. Asbestos litigation reform is now heating up in both the House and Senate.

Both the burger and gun bills have passed the House before but have stalled in the Senate, which is now signaling its willingness to push through other lawsuit reforms as part of a broad effort to constrain litigation.

Earlier this year, the Commercial and Administrative Law Subcommittee, chaired by Cannon, approved both bills that would prevent lawsuits against gun manufacturers and food companies, which Cannon points out are selling legal products to willing customers.

The lawsuits involving guns use the argument that because guns are involved in crimes, the maker of the gun should be held liable. The same goes for burger makers, who according to the lawsuits must be held accountable for knowing that most of the fast food they sell contains unhealthy levels of fat and salt.

Both are examples, Cannon said, of activist lawyers trying to accomplish through the courts what they cannot do legislatively. And in the case of gun manufacturers, just the cost of defending against the lawsuits is driving many to the brink of bankruptcy, which is exactly what the lawyers want, he added.

"Congress must begin to stem the slide down this slippery slope," he said of the gun legislation. "It can do that by fulfilling its constitutional duty and exercising its authority under the Commerce Clause to prevent a few state courts from bankrupting the national firearms industry and denying all Americans their fundamental right to bear arms."

Cannon said the problem extends far beyond guns and fast food — it is ingrained in a society where lawsuits over the most trivial grievance has resulted in soaring liability costs for all goods and services for all Americans.

Another piece of legislation, the Lawsuit Abuse Reduction Act, which is also co-sponsored by Cannon, would change Rule 11 of the Rules of Civil Procedure to require mandatory sanctions against attorneys who file frivolous lawsuits. That bill will also be heard today.

"People are making a living off regulations and the legal system in ways that are costing Americans a great deal," he said.

---

E-mail: spang@desnews.com