The argument against the cap, she said, is that it would violate the Sixth Amendment rights of the plaintiff. When a jury hashes out what damages the defendant owes the plaintiffs, they are not told or instructed to keep it under that cap; they're not even told about it. So if a jury awards an amount higher than that cap, but the statute reduces the amount, that can be argued as a violation of a person's right to a jury trial.

Tort reforms to limit or eliminate such punitive damages, Ford said, have been propelled largely by insurance companies for the last 30 or 40 years.

Montana lawmakers, Ford said, came up with a compromise. After setting the cap, the statute allows punitive damages "for the purpose of punishing a defendant," but only in certain cases, and not in cases of breach of contract, for example. As to where to draw the line on punitive damages, in light of dueling constitutional rights — "That's the issue the Montana Supreme Court is going to look at," Ford said.

In the other part of the appeal, attorneys for the Jehovah's Witnesses say they should not have been found negligent, because they they could not have violated Montana's mandatory reporter statute because church elders are not mandatory reporters when such information is offered in confession.