(The Associated Press circulated the following article by Blake Nicholson on September 17.)
BISMARCK, N.D. — Seven members of Congress from North Dakota and Minnesota have joined the legal battle stemming from a train derailment and chemical spill on the west edge of Minot nearly five years ago.
North Dakota Sens. Kent Conrad and Byron Dorgan and Rep. Earl Pomeroy, and Minnesota Sens. Mark Dayton and Norm Coleman and Reps. Jim Oberstar and Jim Ramstad have filed a legal brief supporting an appeal by derailment victims seeking damages from the Canadian Pacific Railway.
An attorney for the Minot-area residents said he is pleased by what he termed an “unusual” action that will bolster their case. A Canadian Pacific Railway attorney called the lawmakers’ action political and said it will not hurt the railroad in court.
The brief takes issue with a March ruling by U.S. District Judge Dan Hovland in Bismarck, who dismissed a class-action lawsuit against the Canadian Pacific. Hovland ruled that the Federal Railroad Safety Act protects the railroad from such lawsuits.
The legal brief filed by the congressional members says “Congress did not intend any such pre-emption,” and that Hovland’s ruling “is at odds with common sense.”
Hovland did note in his ruling that “the judicial system is left with a law that is inherently unfair to innocent bystanders and property owners who may be injured by the negligent actions of railroad companies.”
The congressional brief says that allowing railroads to be shielded from liability “will only increase their willingness to cut corners and endanger lives.”
The derailment early on the morning of Jan. 18, 2002, sent a cloud of toxic anhydrous ammonia over Minot, killing one man as he tried to escape the farm chemical and sending hundreds of people to the hospital. The National Transportation Safety Board later ruled that inadequate track maintenance and inspections were to blame, a finding the railroad disputed.
Canadian Pacific attorney Tim Thornton said the lawmakers who filed the brief were not in Congress in 1970 when the Federal Railroad Safety Act was passed.
“Even if they were there, I don’t think they’re qualified to speak on intent,” Thornton said. “Courts derive intent from the language of the statute. A handful of legislators responding to their constituency doesn’t reflect the intent of the entire Congress.”
The lawmakers in their brief argue that the Federal Railroad Safety Act does not explicitly eliminate injury lawsuits. “The courts may not read into a bill language and intent the Congress did not consider or enact,” the document says.
Thornton said that if the law does not reflect what Congress intended, “then Congress is fully capable of changing the words.”
Fargo attorney Mike Miller, who appealed Hovland’s ruling to the 8th Circuit, said it is unusual for individual members of Congress to file so-called friend-of-the-court briefs.
“Their concern, I think, really reflects the feelings of almost everybody in the state of North Dakota, that it’s just terrible, even the possibility that these folks don’t have some kind of (legal) remedy,” he said. “The voicing of that opinion on a national level … is wonderful.”