Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource Department of Justice Emails Description An account of the resource The Department of Justice received more than 11,000 e-mails in response to the agency's public solicitation for comments upon its plans to distribute the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund of 2001 established by Congress to benefit the victims of September 11 and their families. These e-mails have been organized here by date. September 11 Email September 11 Email: Body The basic content, as unstructured text; sometimes containing a signature block at the end. Wednesday, January 23, 2002 12:02 AM (no subject) Dear Mr. Feinberg, My daughter was a victim of the attack on the World Trade Center.As we all continue to deal with our losses and grief,I have watched many families struggle with the realization of what their future financial circumstances will be as a result of the implementation of the Victims Compensation Fund.I continue to believe that the worst of these results were unintended, but they are nonetheless real. In authorizing the Fund, Congress significantly diminished the legal rights of victims and their families by limiting the liability of the airlines. While we can understand and support the economic considerations underlying that decision, the decision nontheless substantially altered the opportunities for redress. Regardless of one's views of the difficulties of litigation in this case, the fact that many victims believe that under normal procedures, they would have a reasonable opportunity to recover damages in line with other cases dealt with in our legal system. In removing these rights, it would have been fair to place the victims in a comparable position. I think that many people would also accept some reduction in exchange for the greater certainty and speed inherent in the fund mechanism when compared to litigation. However, the Fund in fact puts many claimants in a far worse position, and in a large number of cases there will be no recovery. The primary defects inthe current scheme are the collateral source offset, the artificial cap on recovery of economic damages and a cap on non-economic damages which bears no relation to awards routinely made in the court system. None of these circumstances would be present if the claimants were proceeding through normal litigation channels. I have been in contact with many families, and I know the extent to which they are suffering as a result of the current compensation structure. They are forced to deal with the worst of personal losses and find themselves denied recourse that would otherwise be theirs. The resulting anger and sense of hopelessness should not have been added to their grief. I have also found that these circumstances are adding to people's disaffection with their government. There has been increasing evidence of the government's failure over many years to recognize and respond evidence of terrorist threats. With the government-mandated compensation system failing to adequately address the needs of so many, people are quick to assign responsibility to the government for the tragedy itself, as well as its economic consequences. Again, whether this view is entirely supportable is not the issue; the fact is that these feelings are widespread and, while perhaps not foreseeable at the time the legislation was enacted, should be addressed in the only meaningful way available, which is to remedy the defects in the compensation plan. Individual Comment September 11 Email: Date The local time and date when the message was written. 2002-01-23 Dublin Core The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/. Title A name given to the resource dojP000002.xml 911DA Item Elements describing a September 11 Digital Archive item. Status The process status of this item. approved Consent Whether September 11 Digital Archive has permission to possess this item. full Posting Whether the contributor gave permission to post this item. yes Copyright Whether the contributor holds copyright to this item. yes Source The source of this item. born-digital Media Type The media type of this item. email Created by Author Whether the author created this item. yes Described by Author Whether the description of this item was submitted by the author. no Date Entered The date this item was entered into the archive. 2002-01-23