Colin Hanna, President of Let Freedom Ring USA, has penned Forced arbitration: Big banks' 'Star Chamber' in the Washington Examiner. Excerpt:
Elbridge Gerry was a colonial-era plutocrat who became a patriot, a signer of the Declaration of Independence and a champion of equal justice under the law. * * *
One of his more famous sayings was that "a tribunal without juries would be a Star Chamber in civil cases" — "Star Chamber" being a reference to the supervisory English court known best for protecting friends of the king and persecuting his enemies.
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[L]eaders like Gerry saw that without the right protections in place, civil proceedings could be used as means to oppress the powerless.
This is exactly what has happened with the ubiquity of forced arbitration. * * *
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[A]rbitration hearings, in tilting the scales of justice heavily to Big Business and rendering consumers virtually defenseless, seem indeed to be the 21st-century version of the Star Chambers. Like the clauses themselves, the hearings remain largely hidden from view, with no jury of one's peers, no real chance for appeal, and no mandate even to adhere to the law, federal or state.
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The practice of forced arbitration is so offensive to any sense of justice – as envisioned by Elbridge Gerry and the other Founders – that conservatives must demand the CFPB rule be preserved until Congress itself has opportunity to revisit the issue and rid America of the Big Banks' Star Chambers.
