ATA Litigation Center
The ATA Litigation Center was established in May 1985, born from a simple but powerful idea: if trucking companies pooled their resources, they could take on big, expensive legal battles that no single carrier could realistically fight alone. From day one, the Center’s mission has been to stand up for the shared interests of motor carriers—through courtroom advocacy, legal education, training, and tracking legal developments that affect the trucking industry.
A Board of Directors keeps an eye on the big picture, while an in-house legal team handles the day-to-day work. The Center steps in to represent ATA in cases that have the potential to shape public policy for the entire trucking industry. The Board chooses which cases to take on using clear criteria, including the likelihood of success, the potential impact on future cases, the benefit to the industry, and the overall cost.
Since its inception, the Center has shown up everywhere—from trial courts all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. The Center also regularly files amicus briefs nationwide in cases that carry major implications for trucking. The work of the Center over the last four decades has achieved more than 150 legal victories, hundreds of millions of dollars in tax refunds, and literally billions of dollars in tax and regulatory savings. These victories have advanced key trucking priorities, such as preserving reasonable hours-of-service regulations, defending against attacks on the independent contractor business model, and beating back excessive state and local burdens on interstate commerce, to name a few.
Every year, the ATA Litigation Center hosts the Trucking Legal Forum, which is widely regarded as the leading trucking industry legal education conference, and an opportunity to forge and maintain valuable connections with colleagues and trucking industry leaders. Two and a half days of CLE accredited sessions annually provide industry attorneys with information on trucking-specific legal issues and highway accident litigation defense best practices. This essential event is designed for in-house and external transportation legal counsel, as well as trucking executives and safety, risk management, and HR professionals.
The Center keeps the ATA membership updated about its efforts and court decisions of interest to the industry through its quarterly eNewsletter, the Docket (subscribe here).
For more information about the Center’s achievements or to discuss potential amicus brief submissions, contact ATA staff liaison Rich Pianka.
Tort Reform
The Legal Reform Advisory Committee (LRAC) is the ATA venue for addressing the highway accident litigation crisis and other forms of lawsuit abuse and civil justice reform initiatives. The Committee brings together all the relevant stakeholders—motor carrier in-house counsel, members of the insurance industry, private-practice lawyers who defend motor carriers, state trucking association executives, and any others concerned with the problem of lawsuit abuse against the trucking industry—to make recommendations to the appropriate policy committees and staff members within ATA on the development and implementation of strategies and solutions to combat lawsuit abuse, and other legal reforms.
The Committee’s mission extends to the development of education and training programs, federal and state legislation, image initiatives, and fundraising to support legal reform efforts financially. For more information, contact ATA staff liaison Pam Bracher.
Carrier Broker Agreements
With approval from the Department of Justice, ATA provides model agreements for motor carrier and broker contractual relationships. The model contracts were developed in consultation with ATA member motor carriers, many of which operate separate brokerage businesses, and reflect comments made by the Transportation Intermediaries Association (TIA) on behalf of its members. The model agreements (short form and long form) are intended to assist motor carriers and brokers in reaching a common understanding of their legal rights and obligations and to cover basic contractual terms, such as the legal status of the parties, freight documentation, insurance coverage, and cargo liability.
Carrier Shipper Agreements
ATA and the National Industrial Transportation League have created the Model Truckload Motor Carrier/Shipper Agreement for use by motor carriers and shippers in structuring their contractual relationships. This model agreement is designed to promote uniformity in contract provisions in order to increase efficiency in negotiations and provide a balanced agreement for shippers and carriers.