Money isn't everything

The love affair between America and the relatives of victims of September 11 could be strained by the initial reaction of some families and their advocates to the proposed federal compensation plan.
The plan provides between $300,000 and $4.35 million per person, based on age and income, and all the families have to do to collect is agree not to sue the airlines. The average payment is estimated at $1.65 million.
The purpose of the legislation was twofold. It provided families with a relatively quick way of getting compensation, and it sought to protect a vital industry, already crippled by the events of September 11, from litigation that could destroy the carriers involved.
The initial reaction was disconcerting. Some families called the offer an insult. The attorney general of New York said it was inadequate. Trial lawyers predictably suggested that families reject the offers and seek "just" compensation in court.
The people of the United States have shown enormous compassion for the 3,000 people who were murdered in the World Trade Center attacks and their families. But the operative word is "murdered." Every year in the United States about six times that many people are homicide victims. Each of their lives is just as precious to their loved ones as were those of the people who died September 11.
Yet only in the most extraordinary of circumstances would any of them receive a multi-million dollar settlement. Various states have crime victim compensation programs, but the most a family could hope to receive from those is about $50,000. For many there is nothing.
Reaction: Now, some family members from the Oklahoma City bombing are asking why they, too, shouldn't be compensated by the government. Because the federal government -- the American people -- did not kill their loved ones. Terrorists did.
The fact that Congress made a pragmatic decision and humanitarian gesture in the Trade Center case does not obligate it to revisit Oklahoma City.
Perhaps in the end, the vast majority of families who lost loved ones September 11 will choose to accept the government's offer and get on with their lives. We hope so.
Their lives will never be the same; they will never recover what they lost. But we must wonder. Those who consider as much as $3 million "an insult," will they be made whole if they go to court and, years from now, get more money?
The tragedy of September 11 has changed the way many Americans think about many things. Would it be too much to ask if it changed the way so many people have come to see large amounts of court-awarded money as the only answer to every wrong?