Which was tried first: Goodridge v. Department of Public Health or Dred Scott v. Sandford?
Dred Scott v. Sandford Dred Scott v. Sandford, 60 U.S. 393 (1857) , also known simply as the Dred Scott case, was a landmark decision by the United States Supreme Court on US labor law and constitutional law. It held that "a negro, whose ancestors were imported into [the U.S.], and sold as slaves", whether enslaved or free, could not be an American citizen and therefore had no standing to sue in federal court, and that the federal government had no power to regulate slavery in the federal territories acquired after the creation of the United States. Dred Scott, an enslaved man of "the negro African race" who had been taken by his owners to free states and territories, attempted to sue for his freedom. In a 7–2 decision written by Chief Justice Roger B. Taney, the court denied Scott's request. The decision was only the second time that the Supreme Court had ruled an Act of Congress to be unconstitutional.
Health court Health courts are proposed specialized courts for handling medical malpractice claims. They are characterized by the use of specially trained adjudicators, independent expert witnesses, and predictable damage awards. Successful administrative compensation systems currently exist in New Zealand and Scandinavia, and limited programs also operate in Florida and Virginia. The nonpartisan coalition Common Good, led by Philip K. Howard, and the Harvard School of Public Health have advocated implementing health courts on a wider scale in the U.S. The potential advantages of health courts include decreasing administrative costs, improving access to compensation for injured patients, and disincentivizing defensive medicine. By using trained judges and independent experts, health court advocates hope to achieve more fair outcomes at lower costs. Critics of the health courts concept contend that is ill-conceived, that it would be unfair to patients, that it would be unlikely to achieve its objectives, and that such of its goals as are reasonable can be achieved more fairly and with greater efficiency under the existing civil justice system. In addition, experts have suggested that health courts would be inevitably biased towards physicians, and that the bureaucracy needed to introduce safeguards against such bias would negate any cost savings.