Caps & Immunities


The Inherent Injustices of Immunity Legislation


George S. Tolley, III


"Lex semper dabit remedium ― The law always gives a remedy.”


-- Latin maxim of law


"Ubi jus ibi remedium ― Where there is a right, there must be a remedy.”


-- Latin maxim of equity I


f it is the purpose of law to provide a means by which society vindicates the values of justice, fairness and equality among its constituents, then these ancient maxims should be unimpeachable. Indeed, it can be said that Chief Justice John Marshall constructed the entirety of our Nation’s constitutional law upon these timeless bedrock principles.1


Tese long-settled principles of law and justice


demand that every individual be held to the same standard of reasonably prudent and careful conduct, and the same standard of liability when negligent conduct injures another person. Each and every year, however, the Legislature considers granting immunity to deprive injured persons of their just and equitable legal remedies. Although it may be safe to presume that most readers of this magazine – published by and primarily for Maryland’s


1 Marbury v. Madison, 5 U.S. (1 Cranch) 137, 147 (1803) (“It is a settled and invariable principle, that every right, when withheld, must have a remedy, and every injury its proper redress”).


Legal Nurse Resource Team


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Trial Reporter / Spring 2011 15


trial bar – understand and agree that immunity legislation is inherently bad, periodically it can be beneficial to review the reasons why immunity legislation is inherently bad. Certainly, such legislation is offered every year in


the General Assembly. Te slow accretion of legislative immunities threatens over time to undermine the law of torts altogether. In the 2008 Session, for example, fourteen (14) bills were introduced that, as originally drafted, would have granted a measure of immunity to wrongdoers for injuries inflicted upon others, including malpractice committed by so-called “volunteer emergency health practitioners,” and harms negligently inflicted by representatives of various County Revenue Authorities.


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