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Accessed 12 October 1999

September 13, 1998

The Lawsuits Pile Up, Matching the List of Atrocities

Fifty-three years after it ended, the Second World War is spawning a new form of international justice that victims hail as long overdue. But some of its targets decry it as a dubious new legal cottage industry, in which some lawyers seize upon human rights abuses as the basis for emotionally charged class-action lawsuits.

In the wake of last month's $1.25 billion settlement between Holocaust survivors and Swiss banks that were accused of profiting from looted Jewish assets, some officials and lawyers involved in the Holocaust cases say they fear that opportunistic lawyers may see a potential gold mine in the precedent, and will seek every opportunity to file suits on behalf of victims of past atrocities.

"I worry about an explosion of these kind of suits," said Bert Neuborne, a New York University law professor working without fee on the Holocaust cases. "That a lot of people will see a potential for what they think is a fast buck."

That is not the only thorny question being raised. More tricky, perhaps, is the question of where it will all end. If Holocaust victims are compensated now, as native American tribes were compensated for past wrongs over the previous two decades, who might be next? African-Americans because their ancestors were slaves? Bosnians who consider the United Nations accountable for breaking promises to protect them?

These are, of course, genuine victims with genuine grievances. The problem is that sometimes sincere efforts to right clear moral wrongs can be seized upon by people with less-than-noble motives. And under legal standards, it is easier to demonstrate damage from some historical wrongs than from others.

The number of suits keeps growing. On Friday, Melvin Weiss, a nationally known class-action lawyer, filed in federal court in Newark, N.J., against the German conglomerate Krupp, charging that it had profited from slave labor during World War II. Two weeks ago, another group of lawyers filed another class action suit in federal court in Brooklyn against more than a dozen German companies, including Krupp.

Over the last year, suits have also been filed against Ford Motor Co., Italian and German insurance companies and French banks accused of profiting from the cruelties of Hitler's Germany. Banks in Sweden, Spain, Portugal and Argentina could be next, Neuborne said.

Asian-American groups, meanwhile, have been scouring the United States for victims of the Nanking Massacre and the use of forced labor by wartime Japan. They hope to file class-action lawsuits in U.S. courts against Japanese corporations, such as Mitsubishi, as well as the Japanese government.

And some black leaders have repeatedly called for reparations to be paid for slave labor in the United States. "If the descendants of Nazi-era slave laborers deserve some compensation, why don't the descendants of the victims of 250 years of American slave labor deserve compensation?" asked Eric Foner, a Columbia University history professor.

But Foner also said it was a difficult question: "How far back do you go? If we want to go all the way back, all the land would go back to the Indians."

Legal experts warn that suits involving other historic grievances may not lead to settlements as quickly as some of the Holocaust cases. Kent Syverud, dean of the Vanderbilt University law school, said suing for damages based on slave labor in the United States would be difficult. He said few records exist that define exactly who was a slave, who is a descendant of a specific slave, and how much the slave-owner benefited from the slave's work.

"The Holocaust suits are different in that they involve much more concrete and identifiable events and records," he said. "The events of slavery are very hard to link it to a specific bank account."

Efforts by groups to sue the American government for damages have achieved mixed results. In the 1970s, Native American tribes successfully sued for the rights to control and profit from vast amounts of land. But legal actions by Japanese-Americans interned during World War II were less successful, and they had to wait until Congress awarded them $20,000 each in 1988.

Among the newer Holocaust suits, the Ford case may provide the clearest indication of difficulties ahead for claimants. While some German companies, for example Volkswagen, have already agreed to create some form of fund to compensate former slave laborers, Ford is vowing to fight.

In the suit, Weiss' team argues that Henry Ford's anti-Semitic remarks in the 1920s and alleged close relationship with Hitler resulted in Ford's subsidiary in Germany never being taken over by the Nazis. But Ian Slater, a Ford spokesman in the United States, said the company lost control of its subsidiary during the war and the factory was badly damaged when Ford regained control of it. He said the suit was an unfair attempt to use bad publicity to force the company to settle.

Then there is the question of lawyers' fees. Weiss said he would request minimal fees. Ed Fagan, who is working on the Swiss bank and German slave labor cases and said he hoped to represent victims of Japanese slave labor practices, said he expected a standard share of settlements. The World Jewish Congress and other Jewish groups that support such legal claims are calling for all lawyers involved in the Holocaust cases to work free.

"We do not believe that the Holocaust is an area anyone should be profiting from," said Elan Steinberg, the organization's executive director.