Litigation concerning the toxic qualities of lead paint provides a down-to-earth capsule of an important aspect of modern products liability law: cases dealing with injuries that large numbers of litigants attribute to the effects of useful chemicals. The subject literally has its homely qualities because it involves the very walls within which many children have grown up. Specific cases in this area may present difficult questions of factual causation. Epidemiological issues may provide legal controversy, if not disputes as fierce as those in some other, cases involving chemicals and fibers. Intuitively, the subject may be one to which judges and jurors can more easily relate than to questions about the tendency of oral contraceptives to cause blood clots or of a morning-sickness drug to produce deformed limbs in children. Despite the mundane origins of the subject, issues ranging from theories of liability and defect through problems of proof and allocation of damages demonstrate the need for judgment and the frequent primacy of policy in the law of products liability. At almost every stage, courts must engage, and supervise juror activity, in the weighing of risks.
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