Weight of other Senate business seen slowing asbestos bill

By Ted A. Knutson

Washington, May 24 - The truce in time-consuming battle over judicial nominations promises to speed progress of the asbestos trust fund bill through the Senate Judiciary Committee. But the weight and wait of other legislation could bog down the Fairness in Asbestos Injury Resolution Act, S. 852, if it comes to the Senate floor, say observers.

The bill's chief sponsor, Judiciary Committee chairman Arlen Specter, R-Pa., is aiming to get the legislation out of committee by Thursday in time for the full Senate to consider the legislation in June.

But if Specter gets his committee to meet his deadline, the $140 billion trust fund to be paid for by asbestos defendants could be mired down by the macro concerns of the Senate calendar rather than the micro issues over the bill, says one key lobbyist.

Matt Webb, vice president of legal reform policy, U.S. Chamber Institute of Legal Reform, said if judiciary's consideration of 80-plus amendments extends into June, it could slow the movement of the bill in the full Senate.

"The further into the year you get, the more focused the Senate floor has to be on appropriations," said Webb.

One of the potential time-consuming matters alluded to by several lobbyists would be Senate consideration of a Supreme Court nominee following the expected resignation of chief justice William Renquist this summer.

Another prospective drag on the passage of the asbestos trust fund through Congress, said the U.S. Chamber of Commerce legal reform official, is the fact that the House has not considered a trust fund bill for several years while the issue has been facing Senators for much of the decade.

However, Asbestos Alliance counsel Pat Hanlon doubts the House education process would be a long one.

"It may have taken two years to get to where we are in the Senate, but it will not take another two years for the House to get up to speed," said Hanlon, the legal adviser for the coalition of asbestos defendant companies and their insurers.

While Hanlon and Webb said the bill is likely to pass committee, American Insurance Association vice president Julie Rochman isn't so sure.

"Anybody giving you odds is pulling numbers out of thin air," she said.

The AIA is opposed to the bill.

Rochman calls the legislation "flawed."

A component of the bill that she says grates the association is that insurers would still have to pay court verdicts for asbestos plaintiffs and pay into the trust fund at the same time as the fund gears up.

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