Comment by bambax
16 hours ago
> Here in the land of the free, it turns out a company only has to honor its contractual obligations for a little while.
Eceryone everywhere appears to hate statuses of limitations, but they exist for a reason, namely that after some time society needs to move on. It may be disappointing, or even cruel, for the victims, but we can't keep litigating the past forever.
Espescially so in the "land of the free" which is the land of lawyers and lawsuits.
I can only hope that my bank will someday feel the same way about my mortgage.
If you had some mistake on your mortgage paperwork in 1993, your bank would probably feel that way about it already.
I realize we're talking about a civil case here and not criminal but it's not factually correct to say statutes of limitations always prevent a historical wrong from being addressed. There's a number of jurisdictions which have no statue of limitations on sexual assault cases for example.
Somewhat randomly chosen reference:
https://www.richardnelsonllp.co.uk/guides/statute-of-limitat...
> it's not factually correct to say statutes of limitations always prevent a historical wrong from being addressed
Nobody has made this claim.
> we can't keep litigating the past forever
It's worth pointing out this reasoning is usually considered self-evident. I've rarely seen anyone doing any kind of deepdive into a practical reason for this.
Litigating events that happened years ago is often impractical. Records are hard to find, memories are poor, witnesses are hard to find or dead, etc.
I think you argue for why don't you let the case be opened and then dismiss it in case there's not enough evidence available. On one level that's not great because it results in a lot of cases opened and then closed for lack of evidence. On another, it's not great because there's significant unfairness when some of these cases are pursuable and some are not --- drawing a line in the sand and giving a specific time frame for things to happen or not seems more fair to me, but I guess it's debatable.
Having unlimited time to litigate also suggests everyone should retain all records forever. That's a very high burden. A statute of limitations of say 3 years for contracts means I can discard old records at my own discretion without worrying that it may result in future liability.
Personally, I have some debts for services rendered where despite my desire and ability to pay, I've been unable to reach the service provider and pay them. I've also got some similar age debts where I certainly did pay them, but I've lost records of payment and it's been long enough that I might not be assured that I did pay them... sometimes things slip through the cracks. A statute of limitations means that my estate (and therefore my heirs) don't have to pay back the heirs of said service providers when they look through records and don't find evidence of payment.
There are only two broad outcomes, either things stay as they are, or much of the US is returned any remaining descendents of various treaty signatories.
The first is effectively a waste of time, the second a messy descent into hell on all sides.
> a messy descent into hell on all sides
Certainly messy & certainly hellish for some. For "all sides" though? I guess maybe if we're counting the fact it would paint a large target on the back of any beneficiaries.
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As a parent of young children it rarely makes sense to litigate anything that happened more than 10 minutes ago, so perhaps people extrapolate from there :-) I'd enjoy that deep dive, though.
That's fair!
At least between adults though, such statutes do appear to overwhelmingly protect the holders of power/wealth/etc. from relinquishing said power/wealth/etc. It's hard to see broad societal benefits of statutes that are diametrically opposed to the interests of victims in all common cases.
I mean, there are very valid reasons behind it.
People are not expected to hold onto there documents forever, humans forget.. and change
Figuring out what happened 3 years ago is hard, figuring out what happened 30 years ago is near impossible & often wrong
This doesn't really seem like a valid reason & I suspect is misdirection.
If this were the case, litigating these instances would simply end quickly due to lack of evidence. There would be no cause for such a statute in such cases.
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Everyone hates them only when they are on the losing side. Imagine you got sued for non-payment by a plumber who fixed your sink 30 years ago, and had to defend yourself in court. The author would change is tune about contracts real quick if this happened to him.
I don’t understand how that fits the author situation. Society isn’t a party, there is no crime or anything like that. We are talking about contractual terms