The Landscape of Civil Litigation in State Courts

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Acknowledgements
This study was undertaken to inform the deliberations
of the Conference of Chief Justices (CCJ) Civil Justice
Improvements Committee as it developed recommen-
dations based on evidence-based practices to improve
civil case processing in state courts. We are grateful to
the committee members and sta who asked probing
questions that spurred us to mine the Landscape
dataset for as much information as could possibly be
gleaned. We are especially indebted to the Committee
Chair, Chief Justice Thomas Balmer (Supreme Court
of Oregon); the chairs of the Rules/Procedures and
Court Operations subcommittees, Judge Jerome
Abrams (First Judicial District Court, Minnesota), and
Judge Jennifer D. Bailey (Eleventh Judicial Circuit,
Florida); the Committee Reporter, Judge Gregory E.
Mize (D.C. Superior Court); and Brittany Kauman and
Corina Gerety of the Institute for the Advancement of
the American Legal System (IAALS), who shouldered
far more than their fair share of research and adminis-
trative support for the Committee’s work.
We are also immensely grateful to the state courts that
participated in the study. It is a gross understatement
to say that state courts today are operating under
enormous pressure to manage voluminous caseloads
with signicantly reduced resources. We recognize
that it is no small task for those courts to allocate
scarce resources to extract case-level data from
their case management systems and, as important,
to answer detailed questions about computer codes
and formatting that is necessary to make sense of the
data. Their willingness to do so is a testament to their
commitment to maintaining the American civil justice
system as a forum for the speedy, inexpensive, and
just resolution of civil claims.
No research project undertaken by the National Center
for State Courts is ever solely the product of the profes-
sional sta assigned to that project. We relied heavily
on guidance and support from colleagues who contrib-
uted many hours to this project brainstorming ideas,
answering questions about related projects, reviewing
report drafts, and generally oering encouragement
throughout the process. We especially acknowledge
the following individuals who were particularly helpful:
Tom Clarke, Vice President, Research & Technology;
Richard Schauer, Director, Research Services; Neil
LaFountain, Senior Court Research Analyst; Pamela
Petrakis, Senior Administrative Manager; Brenda
Otto, Program Specialist, and Bethany Bostron,
Research Intern.
Finally, both the CCJ Civil Justice Improvements
Committee and the Landscape study were generously
supported by a grant from the State Justice Institute
(SJI-13-P-201). The views expressed in this report are
those of the authors and do not necessarily represent
those of the State Justice Institute, the National Center
for State Courts, or the participating courts.

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Table of Contents
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS i
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY iii
INTRODUCTION 1
Challenges Confronting the Civil Justice System 1
Civil Justice Improvement Eorts 4
AN INCOMPLETE PICTURE OF THE CIVIL JUSTICE SYSTEM 6
Data Denitions 8
Data Collection Priorities 9
Organizational Structure 10
PROJECT METHODOLOGY 14
FINDINGS 17
Caseload Composition 17
Case Dispositions 19
Case Outcomes and Judgment Amounts 23
Bench and Jury Trials 25
Time to Disposition 28
Representation Status of Litigants 31
CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS FOR STATE COURTS 35
Distorted Perceptions of Civil Litigation in State Courts 36
The Future of the Civil Justice System in State Courts? 37

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Executive Summary
Much of the debate concerning the American justice
system focuses on procedural issues that add
complexity to civil litigation, resulting in additional cost
and delay and undermining access to justice. Many
commentators are alarmed by the increasing privat-
ization of the civil justice system and particularly by
the dramatic decline in the rates of civil bench and
jury trials. In addition, substantially reduced budgetary
resources since the economic recession of 2008-2009
have exacerbated problems in civil case processing in
many state courts.
In response to these concerns, state and federal
courts have implemented a variety of civil justice reform
projects over the past decade. Some have focused on
particular types or characteristics of civil cases such
as business and complex litigation programs. Others
have aimed at problematic stages of civil litigation,
especially discovery. In 2013, the Conference of Chief
Justices (CCJ) convened a Civil Justice Improvements
Committee to assess the eectiveness of these eorts
and to make recommendations concerning best
practices for state courts. To inform the Committee’s
deliberations, the National Center for State Courts
(NCSC) undertook a study entitled The Landscape
of Civil Litigation in State Courts to document case
characteristics and outcomes in civil cases disposed
in state courts.
Dierences among states concerning data denitions,
data collection priorities, and organizational struc-
tures make it extremely dicult to provide national
estimates of civil caseloads with sucient granularity
to answer the most pressing questions of state court
policymakers. The sample of courts in the Landscape
study was intentionally selected to mirror the variety of
organizational structures in state courts. The resulting
Landscape dataset consisted of all non-domestic civil
cases disposed between July 1, 2012 and June 30,
2013 in 152 courts with civil jurisdiction in 10 urban
counties. The 925,344 cases comprise approximately
ve percent (5%) of state civil caseloads nationally.
FINDINGS
The picture of civil caseloads that emerges from the
Landscape study is very dierent than one might
imagine from listening to current criticism about the
American civil justice system. High-value tort and
commercial contract disputes are the predominant
focus of contemporary debates, but collectively they
comprised only a small proportion of the Landscape
caseload. In contrast, nearly two-thirds (64%) were
contract cases, and more than half of those were debt
collection (37%) and landlord/tenant cases (29%). An
additional sixteen percent (16%) were small claims
cases involving disputes valued at $12,000 or less,
Many commentators are alarmed
by the increasing privatization
of the civil justice system and
particularly by the dramatic
decline in the rates of civil
bench and jury trials.

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and nine percent (9%) were characterized as “other
civil” cases involving agency appeals and domestic
or criminal-related cases. Only seven percent (7%)
were tort cases and one percent (1%) were real
property cases.
To the extent that damage awards recorded in the
nal judgment are a reliable measure of the monetary
value of civil cases, the cases in the dataset involved
relatively modest sums. Despite widespread percep-
tions that civil litigation involves high-value commercial
and tort cases, only 357 cases (0.2%) had judgments
that exceeded $500,000 and only 165 cases (less
than 0.1%) had judgments that exceeded $1 million.
Instead, three-quarters (75%) of all judgments were
less than $5,200. These values varied somewhat
based on case type; three-quarters of real property
judgments, for example, were less than $106,000
and three-quarters of torts were less than $12,200.
For most represented litigants, the costs of litigating a
case through trial would greatly exceed the monetary
value of the case. In some instances, the costs of even
initiating the lawsuit or making an appearance as a
defendant would exceed the value of the case.
Litigation costs that routinely exceed the case value
explain the low rate of dispositions involving any
form of formal adjudication. Only four percent (4%) of
cases were disposed by bench or jury trial, summary
judgment, or binding arbitration. The overwhelming
majority (97%) of these were bench trials, almost half
of which (46%) took place in small claims or other
civil cases. Three-quarters of judgments entered in
contract cases following a bench trial were less than
half of those in small claims cases ($1,785 versus
$3,900). This contradicts assertions that most bench
trials involve adjudication over complex, high-stakes
cases.
Most cases were disposed through an administra-
tive process. A judgment was entered in nearly half
(46%) of the cases, most of which were likely default
judgments. One-third of cases were dismissed, possi-
bly following a settlement; ten percent (10%) were
explicitly recorded as settlements.
Summary judgment is a much less favored disposition
in state courts compared to federal courts. Only one
percent (1%) were disposed by summary judgment,
and most of these would have been default judgments
in debt collection cases except the plainti pursued
summary judgment to minimize the risk of post-dispo-
sition challenges.
A traditional hallmark of civil litigation is the presence
of competent attorneys zealously representing both
parties. One of the most striking ndings in the dataset
was the relatively large proportion of cases (76%) in
which at least one party was self-represented, usually
the defendant. Tort cases were the only ones in which
a majority (64%) of cases had both parties repre-
sented by attorneys. Small claims dockets had an
At least one party was self-represented (usually the defendant)
in more than three-quarters of the cases.

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unexpectedly high proportion (76%) of plaintis who
were represented by attorneys, which suggests that
small claims courts, which were originally developed
as a forum for self-represented litigants to obtain
access to courts through simplied procedures, have
become the forum of choice for attorney-represented
plaintis in lower-value debt collection cases.
Approximately three-quarters of cases were disposed
in just over one year (372 days), and half were disposed
in just under four months (113 days). Nevertheless,
small claims were the only case type that came close
to complying with the Model Time Standards for
State Trial Courts (Standards). Tort cases were the
worst case category in terms of compliance with the
Standards. On average, tort cases took 16 months
(486 days) to resolve and only 69 percent were
disposed within 540 days of ling compared to 98
percent recommended by the Standards.
IMPLICATIONS FOR STATE COURTS
The picture of civil litigation that emerges from the
Landscape dataset conrms the longstanding criticism
that the civil justice system takes too long and costs
too much. As a result, many litigants with meritorious
claims and defenses are eectively denied access to
justice in state courts because it is not economically
feasible to litigate those cases. Most of the litigants
who have the resources and legal sophistication
to do so have already abandoned the civil justice
system either preemptively through contract provisions
(e.g., for consumer products and services, employ-
ment, and health care) or after ling a case in court
through private ADR services. Ironically, private ADR is
often provided by experienced trial lawyers and
retired judges.
The vast majority of civil cases that remain in state
courts are debt collection, landlord/tenant, foreclo-
sure, and small claims cases. State courts are the
preferred forum for plaintis in these cases for the
simple reason that in most jurisdictions state courts
hold a monopoly on procedures to enforce judgments.
Securing a judgment from a court of competent juris-
diction is the mandatory rst step to being able to
initiate garnishment or asset seizure proceedings. The
majority of defendants in these cases, however, are
self-represented. Even if defendants might have the
nancial resources to hire a lawyer to defend them in
The picture of civil litigation that
emerges from the Landscape
dataset conrms the longstanding
criticism that the civil
justice system takes too
long and costs too much.

vi
court, most would not because the cost of the lawyer
exceeds the potential judgment. The idealized picture
of an adversarial system in which both parties are
represented by competent attorneys who can assert
all legitimate claims and defenses is an illusion.
State court budgets experienced dramatic cuts during
the economic recessions both in 2001–2003 and in
2008–2009, and there is no expectation among state
court policymakers that state court budgets will return
to pre-2008 recession levels. These budget cuts
combined with constitutional and statutory provisions
that prioritize criminal and domestic caseloads over
civil caseloads have undermined courts’ discretion
to allocate resources to improved civil case manage-
ment. As both the quantity and quality of adjudica-
tory services provided by state courts decline, it
becomes questionable whether state legislators
will be persuaded to augment budgets to support
civil caseloads.
These trends have severe implications for the future of
the civil justice system and for public trust and con-
dence in state courts. The cost and delays of civil
litigation greatly outpace the monetary value of most
cases led in state courts, eectively denying access
to justice for most litigants and undermining the legit-
imacy of the courts as a fair and eective forum to
resolve disputes. Reductions in the proportion of civil
cases resolved through formal adjudication threaten to
erode a publicly accessible body of law governing civil
cases. Fewer common law precedents will leave future
litigants with lessened standards for negotiating civil
transactions or conforming their conduct in a respon-
sible manner. The privatization of civil litigation likewise
undermines the ability of the legislative and execu-
tive branches of government to respond eectively
to developing societal circumstances that become
apparent through claims led in state courts. Because
the civil justice system directly touches everyone in
contemporary American society — through housing,
food, education, employment, household services
and products, personal nance, and commercial
transactions — ineective civil case management by
state courts has an outsized eect on public trust and
condence compared to the criminal justice system.
If state court policymakers are to return to the tradi-
tional role of state courts as the primary forum for
dispute resolution, civil justice reform can no longer be
delayed or even implemented incrementally through
mere changes in rules of procedure. It is imperative
that court leaders move with dispatch to improve civil
case management with tools and methods that align
with the realities of modern civil dockets to control
costs, reduce delays, and ensure fairness for litigants.
Ineective civil case management by state courts has an
outsized eect on public trust and condence.

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Introduction
Concerns about the slow pace, high costs, procedural
complexity, and lack of predictable outcomes associ-
ated with civil litigation have been raised repeatedly for
more than a century.1 Many of the court reform eorts
of the 20th century were intended to address these
concerns even as courts struggled to manage rapidly
expanding criminal, family, and juvenile caseloads.
After the federal judiciary adopted uniform rules of civil
procedure in 1934, the vast majority of state courts
followed suit, enacting state rules of civil procedure
that often mirrored the federal rules verbatim. In
subsequent decades, courts experimented with a
variety of procedural and administrative reforms to
the civil justice system including simplied evidentiary
requirements for small claims cases, front-loading
discovery through automatic disclosure of witnesses
and other key evidence supporting each party’s claims
and defenses, dierentiated caseow management,
increased judicial case management, and alternative
dispute resolution (ADR) programs.
CHALLENGES CONFRONTING
THE CIVIL JUSTICE SYSTEM
Despite the good intentions, it is clear that these
eorts have either been an inadequate response to
current problems or have been rendered obsolete by
new challenges confronting the civil justice system. In
some instances, reform eorts have even created new
problems. A detailed description of the myriad issues
confronting the contemporary civil justice system
is beyond the scope of this report and, in any case,
would merely duplicate a great deal of scholarly work.
Nevertheless, a brief summary of the most common
complaints and some applicable responses helps to
illustrate the scope of the problem.
• Pleadings. The complaint and answer are the
formal court documents that initiate a civil case
and articulate the factual and legal basis for any
claims or defenses. Increasingly, courts have
moved from notice pleading, in which plaintis
merely state the initiation of a lawsuit, to fact
pleading, in which plaintis are required to state
the factual basis for the claim. Under a fact plead-
ing standard, defendants likewise must state the
factual basis for any legal defenses they plan to
raise. The rationale for fact pleading rather than
notice pleading is twofold. First, because both
parties have knowledge of the factual basis for
their opponent’s claims, they can prepare more
promptly and eciently for subsequent stages
of the litigation process (e.g., discovery, settle-
ment negotiations). Second, fact pleading is also
intended to minimize frivolous litigation by requir-
ing both parties to make a sucient investigation
of the facts before ling claims, thus preventing
the expenditure of needless time, energy, and
resources to defeat unsupported claims.2 In
2009, the U.S. Supreme Court further heightened
the fact pleading standard. In federal courts,
plaintis must now allege sucient facts to allow
a trial judge to determine the plausibility of a
claim.3 This raises Seventh Amendment concerns
that judicial plausibility assessments based on
the factual content in pleadings will displace the
role traditionally played by juries in a full eviden-
tiary trial.4
1 Roscoe Pound is credited with rst raising these concerns in an address to the American Bar Association in 1906. Roscoe Pound, Addre ss at
the American Bar Association Convention: The Causes of Popular Dissatisfaction with the Administration of Justice in A.B.A. Rep., pt. I, 395-417
(190 6).
2 The ease with which litigants may assert legally o r factually unsupported claims is a constant conc ern in the civil justice system. Civil justice
reform le aders initially haile d eorts to impose sanctions on frivolous lings. However, many schol ars have re gretted the institution of such
reforms due to satellite litigation over w hether, in fact, the claims and/or defenses we re known to be unsupported when led. Joint comment
by Helen Hershko et al. on Proposed Amendment to Federal Rules of Civil Proce dure, to Committee o n Rules of Practice a nd Procedure,
Administrative Oce of the Un ited State s Courts, 7 (Feb. 25, 2014), available at http://www.afj.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/Professors-
Joint-Comment.pdf. See also Lonny Homan, The C ase Against the Lawsu it Abuse R educti on Act of 2011, 48 HOUSTON L. RE V. 545 (2011).
3 See Ashcrof t v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662 (2009) (hold ing Iqbal’s factual ple adings insuci ent to state a cla im); Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly, 127 S.
Ct. 1955 (2007) (holding a compla int insucient abs ent factual context to support plausibility for relief).
4 Kenneth S. K lein, Ashcroft v. Iqbal Crashes Rule 8 Pleading Standards on to Unconstitutional Shores, 88 NEB. L. REV. 261 (2009). Scholar s
have also examined S eventh Am endment consequences of heightened factual pleading re quirem ents in se curiti es fraud actions. Allan Ho rwich
and Sean Siekken, Pleadi ng Reform or Unconst itutio nal Encro achment: An Analysis of the Seve nth Amendment Implicati ons of the Private
Securities Litigation Reform Act, 35 SEC. REG. L. J. 4 (2007).

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• Service of process. Traditional procedures for
serving notice in civil lawsuits are functionally
obsolete, especially in suits against individuals.
Typical methods of serving process are riddled
with inaccuracies and inadequacies. In some
cases, private process service companies have
undergone civil lawsuits and criminal prosecutions
regarding service practices.5 One study of process
service in New York’s King and Queen Counties
found that personal service was achieved in only
six percent of civil debt collection cases.6 Service
of process via newspaper publication and/or
posting on the courthouse door seems quaint in
light of technological advancements. The conse-
quences of inadequate service are especially
damaging for individuals who only learn of a case
through court orders authorizing award enforce-
ment by garnishment or asset seizure following
a default judgment. Technological advancements
have alleviated some of the issues surround-
ing inadequate service of process. Electronic
service provides a method of serving process for
especially dicult-to-reach parties. The cost-sav-
ing potential of electronic service is also incredibly
high. However, electronic service is not without
its limitations with potential controversies over
receipt of service and suciency of notice.7
• Discovery. While opinions on excessive discov-
ery may vary from the plainti to the defense bar,
several national surveys report a consensus that
the time devoted to discovery is the primary cause
of delay in the litigation process.8 Most state court
rules and case law permit discovery for anything
that might lead to admissible evidence. This
results in an unfocused, and often disproportion-
ate, approach to discovery in which lawyers fail
to identify key issues and spend time and eort
investigating tangential issues. This expansive
nature of discovery and the resulting delays trans-
late to increased litigation costs. In fact, there are
frequent complaints that discovery costs often
dwarf the value of the case.9 The traditional law
rm business model (based on the billable hour)
and the lack of disciplinary action in response to
excessive discovery lings encourages lawyers to
do more discovery rather than smart discovery.
• Electronically Stored Information (ESI).
Evidence needed to support claims and defenses
increasingly exists only in electronic format rather
than live witness testimony, papers, or other
tangible objects. The costs of ESI discovery
include expenses associated with processing
old data, reviewer complications based on quali-
tative dierences between paper and electronic
documents, and the production of documents.10
The expertise needed to organize, review and
analyze electronic records is also very expen-
sive, further increasing the costs of the discovery
process. A lack of experience and knowledge on
the part of judges and attorneys about how to
assess and manage ESI discovery often leads to
overly broad requests for production. The eects
of over-production are especially felt in special-
ized areas of civil litigation such as business litiga-
5 See NEW YORK CITY BAR ASSOCIATION COMMITTEE ON NEW YORK CIVIL COURT COMMITTEE ON CONSUMER AFFAIRS, OUT
OF SERVICE: A CALL TO FIX THE BROKEN SERVICE PROCESS INDUSTRY available at http://www.nycbar.org/pdf/report/uploads/
ProcessServiceRe port4-10.pdf; Bernice Yeung, “Bay A rea Res idents Su e Process S ervers for Fail ing to Del iver Lawsuits” CALIFORNIA WATCH
(May 24, 2012); Press Release, New York State Oce of the Attorney Ge neral, The New York State At torney General Andrew M. Cuomo
Announces Guilty Plea of Proces s Server Company Owner W ho Denied Thousands of New Yorkers Their Day in Cou rt (Jan. 15, 2010)
available at http://www.ag.ny.gov/press-release/new-york-state-attorney-general-andrew-m-cuomo-announces-guilty-plea-process-server.
6 MFY LEG AL SERVICES, JUSTICE DISSERVED: A PRELIMIN ARY ANALYSIS OF THE EXCEPTIONALLY LOW APPEA RANCE R ATE BY
DEFENDANTS IN LAWSUITS FILED IN THE CIVIL CO URT OF THE CITY OF NEW YORK 6 (2008) available at http://www.mfy.org/wp-content/
uploads/reports/Justice_Disserved.pdf.
7 Ronald Hedges, Ke nneth Rashbaum, a nd Adam Losey, Electronic Service of Process at Home and Abroad: Allowing Domestic Electronic
Servi ce of Proce ss in the Fe deral Courts, 4. FED. CTS. L. R EV. 55, 66, 72-73 (2011).
8 Based on responses of a natio nal sur vey of the American Colle ge of Trial Law yers, America n Bar Association Litigation Section, and the
Nationa l Employment Law yers As sociation. Judi cial res ponses to an accompanying survey a lso indicated that the time required to complete
discovery was the source of the most signicant delay in the litigation process. CORINA GERETY, EXCESS AND ACCESS: CONSENSUS ON
THE AMERICAN CIVIL J USTICE L ANDSCAPE 11 ( 2011) [hereinafter EXCESS AND ACCESS].
9 See Paula L. Hannaford-Agor & Nico le L. Waters, Estimating the Cost of Civil Litigation, 20(1) CASELOAD HIGHLIGHTS 1, 2013 [hereinafter
CASELOAD HIGHLIGHTS].
10 John Beisner, Discovering a B etter Way: Th e Need for Eective Civil Liti gation Reform, 60 DUKE L. J. 547, 564-567 (2010).

3
tion. As the amount of ESI grows, concerns about
costs associated with developing an ecient and
eective ESI discovery process are paramount.11
• Expert evidence. Scientic or expert evidence is
needed to support a growing proportion of claims
in all types of civil cases with respect to both
causation and damages. Procedures developed
to govern the admissibility of expert evidence
require judges, who are rarely subject matter
experts, to make a twofold assessment: 1) the
expert’s qualications to opine on a given issue
and 2) whether the expert’s opinion is suciently
grounded in recognized science to be admissi-
ble in a court of law.12 This process has raised
Seventh Amendment concerns related to judges
usurping the jury’s role in making determinations
about the weight of expert evidence.13
• Mandatory alternative dispute resolution
(ADR). ADR encompasses a range of services
including mediation, arbitration, and neutral case
evaluation and is an integral part of virtually all
civil litigation. It oers opportunities for litigants
to settle their cases, usually in less time than a
formal court hearing (trial) and often at less cost.
Beginning in the early 1980s, many courts intro-
duced procedural requirements that litigants
engage in one or more forms of ADR, or at the
very least consider doing so, especially in lower-
value cases (e.g., less than $50,000).14 ADR
programs are not without their critics.15 Some
allege that mandatory ADR imposes an additional
procedural hurdle on litigants and drives up the
cost of litigation. Other complaints have focused
on the qualications of the professionals who
conduct the ADR proceedings. The fees charged
by ADR professionals also often exceed court
fees.16 Because courts must ensure the quality
of their mandatory arbitration programs, there are
concerns that the maintenance costs for manda-
tory ADR programs will pass on unnecessary
costs to all litigants.
• Summary judgment. Summary judgment rulings
in federal and state courts have broad implica-
tions for the civil justice system.17 The resolution
of a case at the early stages of litigation both
halts the unnecessary continuation of litigation
and contributes to the expansion of discovery.
Rule changes and subsequent case law have
facilitated summary judgment rulings in recent
decades,18 creating controversy as jurisprudence
and rules continue to develop.19 Variations in local
rules and ruling propensities of local judges can
also complicate summary judgment procedures
and make the summary judgment stage a source
of uncertainty for litigants.
• Perceived unpredictability in trial outcomes,
especially jury verdicts. The proportion of civil
cases disposed by trial has decreased dramat-
11 EXCESS AND ACCESS, supra note 8, at 14.
12 Daubert v. Merrel Dow Phar maceuticals Inc., 509 U.S. 579 (1993), further dened the judicial gatekeeping role with respect to expert
witness testimony.
13 See Allan Kanner and M. Ryan Casey, Daube rt and th e Disapp earing Jury Trial, 69 U. PIT T. L. REV. 281 (2007-2008) (discussing the impact of
the Daubert ruling and subsequent seventh amendment co ncerns in the civil justice system). Whi le it will not alleviate constitutional conc erns,
better training for trial judges making expert witness determinations can help en sure more knowledgeable determination s regarding the
admissibility of expert witness testimony. See also For ensic Sc ience s: Judges as G atekeep ers, in JUDGES’ J. (Summer 2015) (publishing articles
by scientic experts to provide knowledge to ju dges and lawyers to asses s the reliabilit y of expert evidence).
14 Oreg on has a mandatory ADR provision for cases und er 50,000. OR. REV. STAT. § 36.400 (3) (2011). New Hampshire requires mediation in
small claims ca ses in which the jurisdi ctiona l amount is in exces s of $5,000. N.H. Cir. Ct. R, Dist. Div. 4.29. Some jurisdictions classify ce rtain
summar y jur y trial programs as ADR programs. For examples of jurisdictions in which summar y jury trials are classied as AD R programs,
see PAULA HANNAFORD-AGOR et al., SHORT, SUMMARY, & EXPEDIT ED: THE EVOLUTION OF CIVIL JURY TRIALS (2012 ) [hereinafter SHORT,
SUMMARY & E XPEDITED].
15 Michael Heis e, Why ADR Programs Aren’t More Appealing: An Empirical Perspective (Cornell Law Faculty Wor king Pap er No. 51) available at
http://scholarship.law.cornell.edu/clsops_papers/51/.
16 RAND CORP., ESCAPING THE COURTHOUSE, RB-9020 (1994) (available at http://www.rand.org/pubs/research_briefs/RB9020/index1.html).
17 See Brooke Coleman, Summar y Judgment: What We Thi nk We Know Vers us What We Ough t to Know, 43 LOY. U. CHI. L. J. 1 (2012)
(descri bing var ious scholars hip on sum mary judgment eects).
18 John Langbien, The Disa ppeara nce of Civil Trial in the United States, 122 YA LE L. J. 522, 566-56 8 (2012).
19 For a succint analysis of summar y judgment in the federal courts, see WILLIAM SCHWARZER et al., THE ANALYSIS AND DECISION OF
SUMMARY J UDGMENT MOTIONS: A MONOGRAPH ON RULE 56 OF THE FEDER AL RULES OF CIVIL PROCEDURE (1991).

4
ically over the past 40 years.20 The reasons for
the decline are numerous and, in some instances,
quite subtle. They include increases in the avail-
ability of alternative dispute resolution (ADR)
programs including contractually required binding
arbitration in many consumer and employment
contracts; the costs for discovery and pretrial
stages of litigation, which have prompted some
litigants to forego trials for a negotiated settlement;
delays in scheduling trials due to the increased
volume of civil cases without commensurate
increases in court resources; and widespread
public perceptions about the unpredictability of
trial outcomes, especially in jury trials.21 Although
empirical research conrms that jury trial verdicts
are actually very predictable,22 the shift away from
trial as the dominant mode of case disposition
has likewise reduced the number of attorneys
with jury trial experience. Consequently, attorneys
are less qualied to assess the merits of their
cases and to advise clients about taking cases to
trial by jury.23
• Lack of court resources allocated to civil
justice. Constitutional guarantees of a speedy
trial in criminal cases tend to relegate civil matters
to the bottom of scheduling priorities.24 This is
exacerbated in tight budgetary cycles as courts
may be operating under furloughs or reduced
hours, further decreasing scheduling options
for civil cases. Some courts have responded
by creating specialized courts, especially for
business or commercial litigation, to address the
recent lack of court resources. Although these
dockets and courts guarantee civil litigation its
own niche in court scheduling, sustaining the
dockets may become challenging as there must
be a sucient case volume to justify the expen-
ditures. Additionally, eorts to provide scheduling
priorities within civil case categories might meet
statutory requirements,25 but the bulk of civil
litigation is then left last in line for scheduling.
CIVIL JUSTICE IMPROVEMENT EFFORTS
The general complaint concerning these challenges is
that collectively they contribute to unsustainable cost
and delay in civil litigation, ultimately impeding access
to justice. These problems have not been allowed
to develop entirely unchecked, however. Across
the country, court leaders have developed a variety
of reform eorts to address issues in the civil justice
system. For example, some states have designed
and implemented programs targeting specic types
of cases, especially related to business, commercial,
or complex litigation. The California Judicial Council
instituted a complex civil litigation pilot program in
response to litigant concerns regarding the “time
and expense needed to resolve complex cases, the
consistency of decision making, and perceptions that
the substantive law governing commercial transac-
tions was becoming increasingly incoherent.”26 Fulton
County, Georgia implemented a Business Court that
moves complex contract and tort cases through the
litigation process in half the amount of time the general
docket moves the same types of cases.27 Other
states have designed and implemented more tailored
projects. In 2009, Colorado began developing pilot
rules and procedures for the Colorado Civil Access
Pilot Project (CAPP) applicable to business actions
20 Marc Gal anter, The Vanishing Trial: An Exa minatio n of Trials and Re lated Mat ters in Fe deral a nd State Cou rts, 1 J. EMPIR. LEGAL ST. 459
(2004) [hereinafter The Vanishing Trial].
21 The rst issue of the Journal of Empirical Legal Studies publish ed the pap ers presented at the ABA Vanish ing Trial Sym posium, which
addressed these and other issues related to vanishing trials.
22 See generally NEIL VIDMAR & VALERIE P. HANS, AMERI CAN JURIES: THE VERDICT (2007) (summarizing several decades of empirical
research on juror decision-mak ing in a var iety of contexts an d concluding that jury verdicts are largel y rational and conform to the weight of the
eviden ce prese nted at trial).
23 Tracy W. McCormac k & Christopher J. Bodnar, Honest y is the Best Policy: It’s Ti me to Discl ose Lack of J ury Trial Experience, 23 GEO. J. LEG.
ETHICS 1 (Winter 2010).
24 U.S. CONST. amend VI. State constitutions also contain provisions guarante eing the r ight to a spe edy trial. See e.g. MO. CONST. art. I, § 18(a).
25 It should be noted that certain civi l matters such as protective order hearings also have temporal scheduling requirements a nd supplant
more generic civil matters in scheduling. For examples of these requirements see e.g., N. H. REV. STAT. ANN. § 173-B:3 (2014) (setting timeli ne
for domestic violence protective order hea ring); VA. CODE ANN, § 16.1-252 (2014) (settin g timeline for removal hear ings in child abuse and
neglect matter s).
26 Nat’l Center for St. Cts., Complex Litigation: Key Findings from the California Pilot Program, 3(1) CIVIL ACTION 1 (2004).
27 Sixt y-ve percent faster dispos ition time for complex contract case s and 56 percent faster dispo sition time for complex tor t cases. FU LTO N
COUNT Y SUPERIOR COURT, BUSINESS COURT: 2014 ANNUAL REPORT 4 (2014).

5
in the Colorado district courts. The CAPP program
focused on developing new procedures to streamline
the pretrial discovery process and minimize expert
witness costs.28 The nal pilot rules were implemented
in 2012 and have been authorized for application to
cases led through December 31, 2014.29
Similarly, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Texas have
all undertaken eorts to coordinate the management
of mass tort litigation through the promulgation of
court rules. For example, the Supreme Court of New
Jersey promulgated a rule enabling the unication
of qualifying mass tort cases for central manage-
ment purposes.30 The rule grants the Administrative
Director of the Courts the power to develop criteria
and procedures for unifying the mass tort litigation,
subject to approval by the Court. Complex litigation
centers generally serve as the clearinghouse for such
litigation. Similar coordination eorts in the form of
dedicated trial calendars have also taken place for
landlord/tenant and mortgage foreclosure cases.
Federal and state courts have also pursued proce-
dural reforms on a broader scale. As discussed
above, federal courts have heightened pleading
standards. New Hampshire also altered their plead-
ing standards (from notice pleading to fact pleading)
in a two-county pilot program implemented in 2010.
The pilot rules were subsequently adopted on a state-
wide basis eective March 1, 2013.31 Statewide rule
changes in Utah have altered the discovery process
in a variety of ways including proportional discov-
ery requirements and tiered discovery based on the
amount in controversy.32 Discovery reforms have also
taken place in the federal courts. The Seventh Circuit
Electronic Discovery Pilot Program aims to reduce the
rising costs of e-discovery through a myriad of reforms
and is currently in phase three of its implementation.33
Some federal agencies are also focusing on civil justice
improvement in certain types of cases. For example, the
Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) recently
issued proposed rules of procedure for debt collec-
tion cases led in state courts to address complaints
concerning venue, service of process, and disclo-
sure of the factual basis for debt collection claims.34
Research organizations such as the NCSC and the
Institute for the Advancement of the American Legal
System (IAALS) have also coordinated with pilot project
jurisdictions to conduct comprehensive outcome and
process evaluations of reform eorts. These imple-
mentation and evaluation reports are a crucial aspect
of ensuring eective and ecient reforms of the civil
justice system. This is especially the case as court
leaders continue to take a proactive stance towards
civil justice reform through eorts such as the
Conference of Chief Justices (CCJ) Civil Justice
Improvements Committee.35
28 State of Col orado Judicial B ranch, A History a nd Over view of the Colorado Civil Access Pilot Project Appli cable to Busines s Actions in District
Court 3, available at http://www.courts.state.co.us/userles/le/Court_Probation/Educational_Resources/CAPP%20Overview%207-11-13.pdf.
CORINA D. GERETY & LOGAN CORNETT, MOMENTUM FOR CH ANGE: THE IMPACT OF THE COLOR ADO CIVIL ACCESS PILOT PROJECT
(Octo ber 2014).
29 Id. at 2.
30 N. J. SUP. CT. R. 4:38A.
31 PAULA HANNAFORD-AGOR ET AL., NEW HAMPSHIRE: IMPACT OF THE PROPORTI ONAL DISCOVERY/AUTOMATIC DISCLOSUR E (PAD)
PILOT RULES 2 (2013 ) [ hereinafter NEW HAMPSHIRE PAD RULES REPORT].
32 PAULA HANN AFORD-AGOR & CYNTHIA LEE, UTAH: IMPACT OF THE REVISIO NS TO RULE 26 ON DISCOVERY PR ACTICE IN THE UTAH
DISTRICT C OURTS (April 2015) [hereinafter UTAH RULE 26 REPORT]. For a synopsis of amendments to Utah’s Rules of Civil Proc edure se e
IAALS, Utah Rules of Civil Procedure, http://iaals.du.edu/library/publications/utah-changes-to-civil-disclosure-and-discovery-rules (last visited
April 14, 2014).
33 For information o n the Seventh Circuit Pilot Program see the program’s website at http://www.discove rypilot.com/.
34 Advanc e Notice of Proposed R ulemaking from Consum er Financial Protection Bureau, 78 Fed. Reg. 218 (propose d Nov. 12, 2013)
(to be codied at 12 CFR Part 1006).
35 In 2013, The Confere nce of Chi ef Justic es create d the Civil Justice Improvements Com mittee. The miss ion of the committee is to translate
the less ons learned fro m state pilot projects, applicable re search, and rule c hanges into guidelines a nd best practice s for civil litigation. The
commit tee’s mandate also includes the d evelopment of caseow management reforms for the improvement of the state court civ il justice
system. Committee membership was  nalized in the spring of 2014 and consists of judges, law yers, academics, researchers, a nd cour t
administrators with broad expertise relate d to civil litigation issue s. The committee membership str ikes a balance bet ween the p lainti and
defense bars, trial and appellate judges, and cour t administrators with case m anagement expe rtise. Both the National Ce nter for State Courts
(NCSC) and the Institute for the Advancement of the A merican Legal System (IAALS) provide research and logistical support to the commi ttee.
The Civil Justic e Improvements Committee is conducting the b ulk of its work throug h plenary meetings and s ubcommittees. This report is m eant
to provide a n overview of the current landscap e of civil litigation in state courts fo r the comm ittee members.

6
The vast majority of civil cases in the United States
are led in state courts rather than federal courts.36
However, other than the actual number of lings, and
sometimes number of dispositions, detailed infor-
mation about civil caseloads in the United States
such as caseload composition, case outcomes, and
ling-to-disposition time, is dicult to obtain. The most
recent large-scale national study of civil caseloads is
the 1992 Civil Justice Survey of State Courts (see
Figure 1).37 In that study, the NCSC collected detailed
information about civil cases disposed in 1992 in the
general jurisdiction courts of 45 large, urban counties
An Incomplete Picture of the Civil Justice System
36 In 2013, litigants led approximate ly 16.9 millio n civil cases in state cour ts compa red to 259,489 civ il cases led in U.S. District C ourts. NCSC
COURT STATISTICS PROJECT, EXAMINING THE WORK OF STATE COURTS, 2013 (2015) (this estimate includes probate and mental health
lings in addition to general civil lings). Fed eral Judicial Caseload Statistics, Table C available at http://www.uscourts.gov/statistics-reports/
caseload-statistics-data-tables?tn=C& pn=All&t=68& m%5Bvalue%5D%5Bmonth%5D=12&y%5Bvalue%5D%5Byear%5D=2014.
37 The Civil Justice S urvey of S tates Cour ts was a periodic study of civil litigation fu nded by the U.S. Depar tment of Justice, Bureau of Justice
Statistics (BJS). The statistical frame of estimating ch aracteristics of cases led in state c ourts based on lings in a sample of th e 75 most
populo us counties was a technique e mployed by BJS to estim ate nation al trends for a numbe r of ongoi ng data collection eorts. Subsequent
iteratio ns of the Ci vil Justic e Survey of State Cour ts (1998, 2001, and 2005) have focused exclusively on case characteri stics and ou tcomes for
bench and jury trials rather than the full ra nge of pos sible case outcomes.
Figure 1: 1992 Civil Justice Survey of State Courts, Case Types
Other Real Property Contract Tort
Automobile Tort 227,515
Premises Liability 65,492
Other Negligence 22,347
Medical Malpractice 18,452
Product Liability 12,857
Intentional Tort 10,879
Other Professional Malpractice 6,860
Toxic Substance 6,045
Unknown Tort 4,708
Slander/Libel 3,159
Seller Plainti (Debt Collection) 189,246
Mortgage Foreclosure 68,919
Buyer Plainti 44,744
Lease 20,687
Other Contract 18,656
Fraud 15,927
Employment 8,159
Title Dispute 8,021
Other Real Property 6,707
Eminent Domain 4,631
Other Civil 2,299

7
and used that information to estimate civil caseloads
and case outcomes for the 75 most populous
counties in the country.38 Of more than 750,000 civil
cases disposed in the 75 most populous counties, it
estimated that approximately half (49%) alleged tort
claims, 48 percent alleged contract claims, and two
percent were real property disputes. Automobile torts
were the single largest subcategory of tort cases,
accounting for nearly two-thirds (60%) of all tort cases.
In contrast, product liability and medical malpractice
cases, which generate some of greatest criticisms of
the civil justice system, reected only four percent of
total civil cases combined. More than half (52%) of
the contract cases were debt collection (seller-plain-
ti) cases, and mortgage foreclosures accounted for
another 18 percent of total civil cases.39
Settlement by the parties was the single most
common outcome for a civil case (62%), compared
to 14 percent default judgments, 10 percent dismiss-
als for failure to prosecute, four percent transfers to
another court, four percent summary judgment, and
only three percent judgments following a bench or jury
trial (see Figure 2).
Subsequent iterations of the Civil Justice Survey of
State Courts focused exclusively on bench and jury
trials. Consequently, more recent descriptions of civil
justice caseloads have relied on aggregate statistics
reported to the NCSC as part of the Court Statistics
Project as well as studies of specic issues in individ-
ual state or local courts. For a variety of reasons, these
types of studies are often unable to provide denitive
answers to the most commonly asked questions.
Part of the diculty stems from the inability of many
case management systems to collect and generate
reports about civil caseloads. Most case manage-
ment systems were initially developed to schedule
and record case lings and events (e.g., hearings and
trials) and report the progress of the case through
the system in general terms. Although some of these
Settlement 62%
Default Judgment 14%
Dismissal 11%
Summary Judgment 4%
Transfer 4%
Arbitration Award 3%
Jury Trial 2%
Bench Trial 1%
Unknown Outcome <1%
Figure 2: 1992 Civil Justice Survey of State Courts, Case Dispositions
38 In the 1992 Civ il Justice S urvey of S tate Cour ts, the U.S. Depa rtment of Justic e, Bureau of Justice Statistics employed a 2-stage stratied
sample in which 45 of the 75 most populous counti es were sele cted based on aggregate ci vil case s led in 1990. For a detailed description of
the sampling methodology, see CAROL J. DEFRANCIS ET AL., CIVIL JURY CASES AND VERDICTS IN LARGE COUNTIES 11 (July 1995). The
Civil Justice Sur vey of State Co urts restricted data collection to cases id entie d as gene ral civil (e.g., tort, contract, and re al prope rty) i n which
monetary damages were s ought. Th e data exclu ded cases involv ing equitable relief as we ll as probate/estate, me ntal hea lth, domestic, othe r
civil, and unknown case types.
39 Thir ty-one states permit mor tgage holders to foreclose on property through an administrative procedure specied by statute without
court involvem ent; 20 states require that foreclosures be condu cted through the court. See REALTYTR AC, FORECLOSURE LAWS AND
PROCEDURES BY STATE, http://www.realtytrac.com/real-estate-guides/foreclosure-laws/.

8
systems capture detailed case-level information, very
few are programmed to extract and report that infor-
mation in a format conducive to a broader manage-
ment-oriented and case propulsion perspective.
DATA DEFINITIONS
A related issue is the relative lack of uniformity in the
use of case denitions and counting rules. In most
courts, the term “general civil” encompasses tort,
contract, and real property lings and dierentiates
those cases from probate/estate, domestic relations,
and mental health cases. But in many courts, court
automation systems are not programmed to oer
a more nely grained picture of civil caseloads. For
example, Figure 3 documents civil lings from general
jurisdiction courts in 17 state single-tier or general
jurisdiction courts that were able to breakdown their
caseloads to seven categories in 2010. The wide
variation in percentages across courts and case types
is largely due to dierences in how those states dene
and count cases, dierences in whether cases are led
in the general jurisdiction court or in limited jurisdiction
courts (which are not reected in the graph), and dier-
ences in state law and community characteristics that
Figure 3: Incoming Civil Caseload Composition in 17 General Jurisdiction Courts, 2010
Kansas* 193,402 81% 5% 4% 2% 1% 2% 6%
North Carolina 106,166 78% 1% n/j 10% 3% n/j 9%
Colorado 130,716 77% 9% n/j 4% 1% 4% 5%
Mississippi 27,611 75% n/j n/j 14% 1% n/j 11%
Missouri* 317,613 69% 7% 4% 5% 1% 5% 10%
Utah 125,670 67% 4% 15% 2% 7% 2% 4%
New Jersey 1,004,778 65% 21% 5% 6% <1% n/j 1%
North Dakota* 35,633 57% 14% 15% 1% 1% 5% 7%
Minnesota 211,898 48% 5% 24% 2% 3% 2% 16%
Maine 47,225 46% n/j 24% 2% 1% 2% 25%
Connecticut 149,027 44% <1% 43% 10% 1% n/j 3%
Alabama 51,723 40% 3% n/j 16% 1% n/j 39%
Oregon 193,458 40% 5% 39% 3% <1% 4% 9%
Rhode Island 11,286 38% <1% <1% 25% 7% n/j 30%
New Hampshire 7,864 37% n/j 1% 20% 5% <1% 38%
Washington 102,813 31% 19% n/j 9% 20% 10% 11%
Hawaii 12,998 23% 17% n/j 9% 16% 5% 30%
Contract
61%
All Other
Civil
7%
Probate
11%
Small
Claims
11% Tort
6%
Real
Property
2%
Mental
Health
2%
STATE TOTAL INCOMING
CASES
Note: States in bold have a single-tiered court system. “n/j” indicate s no jurisdictio n over that case type.
* These states process all civil cases in their general jurisdiction cour t.
“All Other Ci vil” cases include civil appea ls, habe as corpus, non-d omesti c restraining ord ers, ta x cases, w rits, and other civil case s.
Source: R. L aFountain et al., Examining the Work of States Cour ts: An Analysis of 2010 State C ourt Caseloads (NCSC 2012).

9
aect the types of legal disputes that might be litigated
in those states.
Similarly, courts dier with respect to how case events
are counted. For example, when a civil case has
been closed and is then reopened for some reason
(e.g., a default judgment that is later challenged for
lack of service in the original case), some courts
will count the case as a new case. Other courts will
count this as a reopened case and still others as the
same case that was originally adjudicated. Although
there is no requirement that state and local courts
adopt uniform case denitions and counting rules,
the NCSC Court Statistics Project has promulgated
standardized data denitions and counting rules for
more than three decades.40 Courts are increasingly
adopting the standards and integrating them into their
case management systems to be able to compare
their caseloads with those of other courts and to take
advantage of more sophisticated case management
tools available in newer case automation systems.
DATA COLLECTION PRIORITIES
Another factor contributing to the diculty in obtain-
ing a detailed national picture about the civil justice
system is courts’ philosophical focus on operational
process rather than substantive outcomes in civil
litigation. Whether an enforceable judgment had been
entered in a case is generally considered operationally
more important than which party prevailed in the case
or what remedy the judgment actually ordered (e.g.,
money damages, specic performance, or injunctive
relief). Those details are obviously important to the
parties, and legislative and executive leaders might be
interested for the purpose of informing public policy,
but the primary objective of the judicial branch has
always been to provide an objectively fair process
for resolving disputes. Thus, focusing attention on
substantive outcomes was often viewed as unseemly
and potentially detrimental to public condence in
the objectivity and neutrality of the judicial branch.
Documentation of case outcomes, where it existed at
all, was often captured in text les in case automation
systems and was consequently extremely dicult to
extract and manage in an aggregate format.
Clearance rates, which traditionally express the ratio
of new lings to dispositions over a given period
of time, served as the primary measure of court
eciency. Clearance rates do not, however, document
the amount of time expended from ling to disposi-
tion. Beginning in the mid-1970s, concerns about
court delay led many prominent court and bar organi-
zations to promulgate time standards as aspirational
deadlines for resolving cases.41 A major criticism of
these standards was that they were often based on
the amount of time that these organizations thought
cases should take to resolve rather than the amount of
time that cases actually took to resolve. For example,
the national time standards promulgated by the
Conference of State Court Administrators (COSCA)
in 1983 specied that all civil cases resolved by jury
trial should be disposed within 18 months of ling,
and all non-jury civil cases should be tried, settled,
or disposed within 12 months of ling. Based on the
cases examined in the 1992 Civil Justice Survey of
State Courts, however, less than half (49%) of non-jury
cases met those standards and only 18 percent of
jury trial cases did so. The discrepancy between the
aspirational time standards and actual disposition
time served as a considerable disincentive for courts
to adopt those standards, much less to publish their
performance based on the standards. Since then,
researchers have developed and promulgated more
empirically based standards including the Model Time
Standards for State Trial Courts, which was a collab-
orative eort by the Conference of Chief Justices,
the Conference of State Court Administrators, the
American Bar Association, the National Association
for Court Management, and the NCSC. The Model
Time Standards now recommend that 75 percent of
civil cases should be fully disposed within 180 days,
90 percent within 365 days, and 98 percent within
540 days.
40 The State Court Model Statistical Dictionary (1980), developed jointly by the Conferenc e of State Court Administrators and the National Center
for State Cour ts, was the rst eort to provid e a uniform set of data denitio ns. The Dictionar y was revise d in 1984 and again in 1989. The
Dictionary was replaced with the State Court Guide to Statistical Reporting (Guide) in 2003. T he most re cent ver sion of the Guide was
published in 2014.
41 For a summary of the evolution of various time standards for civil cases, see RICHARD VAN DUIZEND, MODEL TIME STANDARDS FOR STATE
TRIAL COURTS 13-15 (2011) [hereinafter MODEL TIME STANDARDS].

10
ORGANIZATIONAL STRUCTURE
Perhaps the largest hurdle to learning about civil litiga-
tion in the state courts lies at the heart of courts as
organizations. State court organizational structures
are the culmination of each state’s unique legal history
and eorts to improve the administration of justice.
Accordingly, state courts organizational structures can
be as unique as the constituencies they serve. Data
collection eorts must accommodate these varying
structures without sacricing data integrity and report-
ing. To consider how this may be done, it is imperative
to fully consider the diversity of organizational struc-
tures across courts with civil jurisdiction.
Figure 4 illustrates how state courts allocate jurisdic-
tion over civil lings among general jurisdiction and
limited jurisdiction courts. The most common organi-
zational structure (20 states) involves a single general
jurisdiction court and a single limited jurisdiction court.
The two courts may have exclusive jurisdiction over
particular types of cases or cases involving certain
amounts-in-controversy. Some states provide for
over-lapping (concurrent) jurisdiction for a specied
range of cases based on amount-in-controversy. Ten
states and the District of Columbia have only a single-
tier general jurisdiction court for general civil cases,
although many of these permit local courts to organize
their dockets and judicial assignments based on case
type or amount-in-controversy.
The remaining states exhibit some combination of
multiple general jurisdiction and limited jurisdiction
courts. In most instances, these courts are situated
within individual counties, municipalities, or judicial
divisions encompassing multiple counties. However,
a few states also maintain statewide general or
limited jurisdiction courts over specic types of cases.
Examples include Courts of Claims in Michigan, New
York, and Ohio, which have jurisdiction over civil
cases in which the state is a litigant; Water Courts
in Colorado and Montana, which have jurisdiction
over civil cases involving claims to water rights; and
Worker’s Compensation Courts in Montana and
Nebraska, which have jurisdiction over administrative
agency appeals.
Eleven states have a single general jurisdiction court
with two or more limited jurisdiction courts. In Georgia,
for example, the Superior Court is the general jurisdic-
tion court for the state’s 149 counties; the Superior
Court is organized into 49 judicial circuits and has
jurisdiction over tort, contract, and all real property
cases as well as civil appeals from the State Courts
(70 courts), the Civil Courts (in Bibb and Richmond
Counties, only), and the Municipal Courts (383 courts).
The State Court has concurrent jurisdiction with the
Superior Court for tort and contract cases; the Civil
Courts have jurisdiction over tort and contract cases
up to $25,000 in Bibb County and up to $45,000 in
Richmond County; the Municipal Courts have jurisdic-
tion over small claims up to $15,000 and, in Bibb and
Richmond Counties, concurrent jurisdiction with the
Civil Court over tort and contract cases.
Eight states have multiple general jurisdiction courts
with concurrent jurisdiction over general civil matters
and one or more limited jurisdiction courts. Delaware,
for example, has both a Court of Chancery, which
has general jurisdiction over tort, contract, and real
property cases seeking equitable relief, and a Superior
Court, which has general jurisdiction over civil cases
seeking money damages or other legal relief. In
addition, Delaware has two limited jurisdiction courts:
the Court of Common Pleas, which has jurisdiction
over tort, contract, and real property cases up to
$50,000, and the Justice of the Peace Court, which
has jurisdiction over tort, contract, and real property
cases up to $15,000.
Maine has two general jurisdiction courts — the
District Court and the Superior Court — with concur-
rent jurisdiction over general civil matters. The primary
dierence in jurisdictional authority is that the District
Court has exclusive jurisdiction over small claims
cases (up to $6,000) and cannot conduct jury trials in
general civil cases.
Figure 5 illustrates the maximum amount-in-con-
troversy thresholds for litigants to le in limited juris-
diction courts. The thresholds range from $4,000
(Kentucky) to $200,000 (Mississippi and Texas).42 In
18 states, the general jurisdiction and limited juris-
42 The County Court in Mis sissippi has jurisdiction over tort, contract, and real property cases seeking mo ney damages or other legal relief up
to $200,000; the Chancery Court has jurisdiction ove r civil c ases seeking equitable relief. County Courts in Texas have jurisdiction over tort,
contract and real p roper ty cases up to $200,000 and the Justice Courts have jurisdiction over tort, contract, and real propert y up to $10,000.

11
Figure 4: Organization of State Court Jurisdiction over General Civil Cases
WA
OR
NV
CA
ID
MT
UT
AZ
CO
NM
ND
SD
NE
KS
OK
TX
MN
IA
MO
AR
LA
WI
IL
MI
IN OH
KY
TN
AL
MS GA
FL
SC
NC
VA
PA
NY
VT
NH
ME
RI
CT
NJ
MD
MA
WY
HI
AK
WV
DE
DC
SINGLE TIER 1 GJC AND
1 LJC
2+ GJC AND
1 LJC
GJC AND
2+ LJC
2+ GJC AND
2+LJC 2+ GJC

12
diction courts have concurrent jurisdiction up to the
amount-in-controversy threshold for the limited juris-
diction court. That is, a litigant can opt to le a case
up to the threshold in either the general jurisdiction
or the limited jurisdiction court in those states. Ten
states have concurrent jurisdiction for civil cases with
the minimum threshold for ling in the general jurisdic-
tion court ranging from as little as $50 in Tennessee
to as much as $10,000 in Alabama. In the remaining
nine states, the general jurisdiction and limited juris-
diction courts each have exclusive jurisdiction for their
respective caseload thresholds ranging from $4,001 in
Kentucky to $52,001 in Nebraska.
States also dier with respect to the types of cases
encompassed by their civil caseloads. In addition to the
more widely recognized categories of tort, contract,
and real property disputes, a civil case may refer to
any non-criminal case including family and non-crimi-
nal juvenile matters, probate/estate and guardianship
matters, mental health cases, state regulatory and
local ordinance violations, trac infractions, small
claims, and appeals from state and local executive
agency decisions. State general jurisdiction courts are
typically authorized to hear appeals of decisions from
civil cases adjudicated in limited jurisdiction courts,
often on a de novo basis. Although some states have
created general jurisdiction courts specically for family,
juvenile, or probate and estate matters, in those states
that maintain only a single general jurisdiction court
(single-tier courts), local courts often segregate their
civil dockets to manage family, juvenile, and probate/
estate cases separately from general civil cases.
Nevertheless, the resources allocated to courts with
broad jurisdiction over civil cases are generally shared
across all case types. Most states have eliminated the
distinction between law and equity for the purposes of
civil procedure, but some states — notably Delaware
Figure 5: Maximum Amount-In-Controversy to File in Limited Jurisdiction Courts
WA
OR
NV
CA
ID
MT
UT
AZ
CO
NM
ND
SD
NE
KS
OK
TX
MN
IA
MO
AR
LA
WI
IL
MI
IN OH
KY
TN
AL
MS GA
FL
SC
NC
VA
PA
NY
VTNH ME
RI
CT
NJ
MA
WY
HI
AK
WV MD
DE
DC
N/A $0 TO
$5,000
$5,001 TO
$10,000
$10,001 TO
$15,000
$15,001 TO
$25,000
$25,001 TO
$50,000
$50,001 AND
OVER

13
WA
OR
NV
CA
ID
MT
UT
AZ
CO
NM
ND
SD
NE
KS
OK
TX
MN
IA
MO
AR
LA
WI
IL
MI
IN OH
KY
TN
AL
MS GA
FL
SC
NC
VA
PA
NY
VT
NH
ME
RI
CT
NJ
MA
WY
HI
AK
WV
MD
DE
DC
43 Small claims co urts were originally develope d for self-represe nted liti gants, but states vary with re spect to whether and under w hat cond itions
lawyers may appe ar on beh alf of clients in small claims cour t.
rules regardless of whether they are represented by
counsel or self-represented.
All of these factors — the lack of common data deni-
tions, diering organizational structures and subject
matter jurisdiction for trial courts, and the traditional
reluctance to collect and report performance measures
— make it extraordinarily dicult to compile an
accurate picture of civil litigation based on aggregate
statistics published by state courts themselves. The
only reliable method of doing so involves the extremely
time-consuming and labor-intensive task of collecting
case-level data from the trial courts themselves and
mapping them onto a common template that facili-
tates both a reliable count of the cases themselves
and an “apples-to-apples” comparison among courts.
and Mississippi — maintain separate courts for law
and equity at either the general jurisdiction or limited
jurisdiction court level.
Small claims cases are lower-value tort or contract
disputes in which litigants may represent themselves
without a lawyer.43 Most small claim dockets also
involve somewhat less stringent evidentiary and proce-
dural rules. Figure 6 illustrates the amount-in-con-
troversy maximums for small claims cases, which
range from $1,500 in Kentucky to up to $25,000 in
Tennessee. In many instances, the limited jurisdiction
courts have exclusive jurisdiction over small claims
cases; litigants opting to le their cases in the general
jurisdiction court, or in limited jurisdiction courts rather
than in the small claims docket, are expected to
adhere to the established procedural and evidentiary
Figure 6: Maximum Amount-In-Controversy for Small Claims Cases
$5,001 TO
$10,000
$10,001
AND OVER
≤ $5,000

14
A perennial challenge in conducting multi-jurisdictional
research using data extracted from case management
systems (CMS) is to obtain data with both sucient
accuracy and granularity to be able to make reliable
comparisons across jurisdictions. For several reasons,
the NCSC decided to limit the potential courts from
which to request data to courts with civil jurisdiction
in counties that have participated in the Civil Justice
Survey of State Courts series. First, those courts have
participated in numerous NCSC research studies over
the past three decades and thus are familiar with the
NCSC and condent in the quality of the research
conducted, which tends to improve participation
rates. Likewise, NCSC sta are familiar with the CMS
in those courts and condent in their ability to extract
CMS data. The NCSC also had condence that those
courts would be able to produce data with sucient
case and disposition type granularity for the present
study based on their previous participation in the Civil
Justice Survey of State Courts.
To select the courts to participate in the Landscape
of Civil Litigation in State Courts, the NCSC randomly
selected 10 counties from the 45 counties that partici-
pated in all four iterations of the Civil Justice Survey of
State Courts. The sampling design classied counties
into two categories based on the organizational struc-
ture of courts with civil jurisdiction: (1) counties with a
unied general jurisdiction court in which all civil cases
are led (single-tier courts); and (2) counties with one
or more general jurisdiction courts and one or more
limited jurisdiction courts (multi-tier courts). The intent
of the sampling design was to ensure some represen-
tation of dierent organizational structures found in
state courts. The counties that were selected are listed
in Table 1. These included two counties with single-
tier courts, and eight counties with multi-tier courts.
Within the 10 counties were 36 courts of general juris-
diction and 116 courts of limited jurisdiction.44
The two single-tier courts have segmented dockets
for civil cases within the unied court structure. The
docket assignments for the Santa Clara County
Superior Court are based on the amount in contro-
versy: the limited civil docket includes all cases with
claims valued less than $25,000 and the unlimited civil
docket includes all claims $25,000 and over.45 The
Cook County Circuit Court employs dierent dockets
for legal and equitable claims and for small claims.
Three counties have three separate tiers of trial courts
with jurisdiction over civil cases.46 Marion County,
Indiana has two general jurisdiction trial courts — the
Circuit Court and the Superior Court — that have
concurrent jurisdiction over tort, contract, and real
property cases. There is no monetary threshold for
cases led in these courts, but small claims cases up
to $6,000 can be led in any of nine Marion County
Small Claims Courts.47 Harris County, Texas has one
general jurisdiction trial court (the District Court), which
has jurisdiction over civil cases involving claims greater
than $200 as well as exclusive jurisdiction for adminis-
trative agency appeals. The Harris County Civil Court
of Law is a limited jurisdiction court with jurisdiction
over civil cases involving claims up to $200,000. The
Civil Court of Law also has exclusive jurisdiction over
eminent domain cases in Harris County and appeals
from the Harris County Justice of the Peace Court
(Justice Court).48 Finally, the Harris County Justice
Court has jurisdiction over tort, contract, real property,
and small claims up to $10,000. Cuyahoga County
has a countywide general jurisdiction trial court (Court
Project Methodology
44 In the Texas judicial sys tem, each District Court, Civil Court of Law, and Justice Court is comprised of a single judge elected to that oce. In
the Indiana judicial syste m, the Superior Co urt and the Circuit Cour t are courts of general jurisdiction that have concurrent jurisdiction over civil
matters. In the Ohio judici al system, the Cour t of Claims is a statewide general juri sdiction cour t with jur isdiction over ci vil matters in which state
agenci es are named as litigants.
45 The $25,000 monetary threshold di erenti ating limited from unlimited civil c ases is a remnant from the cou rt structure in place pri or to 2000,
when the California judicial bra nch unied its trial cour ts into a single tier. With unication, the former municipal courts, which had jurisdiction
over civi l cases up to $25,000, were incorpo rated into the county superior cour ts. Most c ourts maintai ned the $25,000 threshold as a familiar
mechanism for case assignments.
46 The 1816 Indiana Constitu tion established the Ci rcuit Co urt (IND. CONST. art. 7, §8) and the Ma rion Co unty Superior Court was established by
statute in 20 04 (IND. CODE § 33-33-49). By agreement, th e Superior Cour t exercises exclusi ve jurisdiction over criminal case s and the Sup erior
and Circuit Cour ts have concurrent jurisdiction over civil cases. T he Circuit Cour t has exclusive jurisdiction for insurance reorganizations/
liquidations, medical l iens, an d Marion County tax col lectio n cases. The Circu it Cour t also su perv ises the M arion C ounty Small Claims Cour ts.
47 Each township in Marion County ha s a Small Cl aims Court. These cour ts have jurisdiction over civil cases in which the claim for damages
does not exc eed $6,000. Generally, a small claims case may be led in any township’s Small Claims Court, however all la ndlord /tenant cases
must be led in the township whe re the propert y is locate d.
48 In Texas, each tr ial court judg e is recognized as a n individual “court.” Conse quently, there are 25 district courts, 4 civil courts of law, and 16
justice courts in Harris Count y. Each trial court l evel is supporte d administrative ly by a cler k of cour t.

15
GJC 1 Superior Court
LJC 26 Justice Court
SIngle 1 Superior Court
Tier
GJC 1 Circuit Court
LJC 1 County Court
GJC 1 Circuit Court
LJC 1 District Court
SIngle 1 Circuit Court
Tier
GJC 1 Superior Court
GJC 1 Circuit Court
LJC 9 Small Claims Court
GJC 1 Superior Court
LJC 1 Tax Court
GJC 1 Court of Common Pleas
GJC 1 Court of Claims
LJC 12 Municipal Court
GJC 1 Court of Common Pleas
LJC 46 Magisterial District Court
GJC 25 District Court
LJC 4 Civil Court of Law
LJC 16 Justice Court
Table 1: Counties and Courts Selected for Landscape of Civil Litigation in State Courts
COUNTY COURT NAME SUBJECT MATTER JURISDICTION
Tort, contract and real property claims involving
monetary relief $1,000 and over. Real property
claims involving non-monetary relief.
Tort, contract and real property claims involving
monetary relief up to $10,000.
Exclusive small claims up to $3,500.
All tort, contract and real property. Civil cases up
to $25,000 assigned to limited civil docket; civil
cases $25,000 and over assigned to unlimited
civil docket. Small claims up to $10,000.
Appeals from small claims decisions assigned
to limited civil docket.
Tort, contract and real property claims $15,001
and over. Appeals from County Court.
Tort, contract and real property claims $5,001 to
$15,000. Exclusive small claims up to $5,000.
Tort, contract and real property $5,000 and over.
Exclusive mental health, probate/estate, and
administrative agency appeals.
Tort, contract and real property up to $40,000.
Exclusive small claims up to $5,000.
All tort, contract and real property. Claims
involving monetary relief assigned to Law
Division; claims involving non-monetary relief
assigned to the Chancery Division. Small claims
up to $10,000.
Tort, contract and real property (concurrent with
Circuit Court). Appeals from Small Claims Court.
Tort, contract and real property (concurrent
with Superior Court). Exclusive jurisdiction for
insurance reorganizations/liquidation and medical
liens. Exclusive jurisdiction for Marion County tax
collection. Supervision of Small Claims Court of
Marion County.
Small claims up to $6,000.
All tort, contract, and real property. Claims involving
monetary relief assigned to Law Division; claims
involving non-monetary relief assigned to Chancery
Division; Special Civil Part manages claims for
monetary relief up to $15,000 without jury trial
and exclusive small claims up to $3,000.
Administrative agency appeals, tax cases.
Tort, contract and real property claims $15,000
and over. Administrative agency appeals. Exclusive
mental health/probate.
Exclusive claims led against the State of Ohio
and claims led under the Victims of Crime
Compensation Program.
Tort, contract, and real property up to $15,000.
Small claims up to $3,000.
Tort, contract and real property, probate/estate,
and administrative agency appeals.
Small claims up to $12,000.
Tort, contract, and real property $201 and over.
Exclusive administrative agency appeals.
Tort, contract, and real property up to $200,000.
Appeals from Justice Courts. Exclusive jurisdiction
over eminent domain cases in Harris County.
Tort, contract, and real property up to $10,000.
Small claims up to $10,000.
TYPE
COURTS
#
COURTS
Harris County, Texas
Maricopa County, Arizona
Santa Clara County, California
Miami-Dade, Florida
Oahu, Hawaii
Cook County, Illinois
Marion County, Indiana
Bergen County, New Jersey
Cuyahoga County, Ohio
Allegheny County, Pennsylvania

16
of Common Pleas) with jurisdiction over civil claims
exceeding $15,000 as well as appeals from admin-
istrative agencies and mental health/probate cases.
Civil claims up to $15,000 are led in the 12 munic-
ipal courts in Cuyahoga County. In addition to these
county-based courts, Ohio has a statewide Court of
Claims, which has jurisdiction over civil claims in which
the State is a defendant as well as claims led in the
Victims of Crime Compensation Program.
The remaining ve counties in the sample each have
a single general jurisdiction court and a single limited
jurisdiction court. Bergen County Superior Court has
exclusive jurisdiction for all general civil cases, but a
separate limited jurisdiction Tax Court has jurisdiction
over administrative agency appeals and tax cases.
The monetary thresholds for the other four limited
jurisdiction courts range from $10,000 (Maricopa
County Justice of the Peace Court) to $40,000 (Oahu,
Hawaii District Court). The general jurisdiction and
limited jurisdiction courts in Miami-Dade maintain
exclusive jurisdiction over their respective caseloads.
The Miami-Dade County Court has jurisdiction over
cases up to $15,000 and the Circuit Court has juris-
diction over cases exceeding $15,000. The general
jurisdiction and limited jurisdiction courts in Allegheny
and Maricopa Counties and Oahu have concurrent
jurisdiction over some portion of their respective civil
caseloads ($0 to $15,000 in Allegheny County, $1,000
to $10,000 in Maricopa, and $5,000 to $40,000
in Oahu).
All of the counties in the sample have small claims
courts. The monetary thresholds for small claims range
from $3,500 (Maricopa County, Arizona) to $12,000
(Allegheny County, Pennsylvania). With the exception
of Bergen County, jurisdiction for small claims cases is
exclusively in the limited jurisdiction courts in counties
with multi-tier court structures.
In November 2013, NCSC contacted each of these
courts in a letter that described the goals and objec-
tives of the Landscape of Civil Litigation in State
Courts study and requested their participation by
providing case-level data for all non-domestic civil
cases disposed in those courts between July 1, 2012
and June 30, 2013.49 The requested data elements
included the docket number, case name, case type,
ling and disposition dates, disposition type, the
number of plaintis and defendants, the representation
status of the parties, and the case outcome including
award amounts. NCSC project sta obtained detailed
case-level data from all of the contacted courts except
the Superior Court of California, Santa Clara County;
the Bedford, Cleveland Heights, and South Euclid
Municipal Courts in Cuyahoga, Ohio; the Ohio Court
of Claims50; and the Decatur and Pike Township Small
Claims Courts in Marion County, Indiana.51
Upon receipt of the case-level data, NCSC project
sta formatted the individual datasets to conform
to a common set of data denitions based on the
NCSC State Court Guide to Statistical Reporting.52
The coding process also involved aggregating some
records to obtain a single code or value per case for
datasets that included multiple records per case (e.g.,
judgment amounts, representation status). The nal
dataset consisted of 925,344 cases including aggre-
gated cases from courts unable to provide case-level
data. The NCSC originally intended to apply case
weights to estimate civil cases, characteristics, and
outcomes nationally, but was unable to generate
reliable estimates due to the small sample size and the
complexity of the weighting procedure. Consequently,
these ndings report statistics only for the courts
serving these 10 counties. The counties themselves,
however, reect the variation in national court organi-
zational structures for civil cases. Collectively, their
caseloads comprise approximately ve percent of
general civil caseloads nationally.
49 The State Court Guide to Statistical Reporting includes the following case types as non-domestic civil cases: tort, contract, real property,
guardianship, probate/estate, mental health, ci vil appeals, and miscellaneous civil ( habeas corpus, writs, ta x, and no n-domestic restraining
orde rs). NAT’L CTR STATE CTS., STATE COURT GUIDE TO STATISTICAL REPORTING (ver. 2.0) 3-8 (2014) [hereinafter STATE COURT GUIDE].
50 The Ohi o Cour t of Claims was unabl e to identify cases originating in Cuyahoga Count y. NCSC sta estimated the number of c ases by
multiplying the propor tion of the Ohio pop ulation residing in Cuyah oga County by the tota l cases led in the O hio Court of Claims for one year.
51 The NC SC was ultimately ab le to obtain aggregate case informatio n for these courts from the Ad ministrative Oce of the Cou rts in the
respec tive states, which eliminated the need to select replacement counties.
52 The State Court Gu ide provi des a standardized framework for state court caseload statistics, enabling meaningful comparisons among state
courts. STATE COURT GUIDE supra note 49.

17
CASELOAD COMPOSITION
Table 2 shows both the total number of disposed
civil cases provided to the NCSC by court structure
type and the percentage breakdown of these cases
by broad case type descriptions (contract, tort, real
property, small claims, and other civil). Limited jurisdic-
tion courts within multi-tier court structures disposed
of 43 percent of the total civil caseload. The single-tier
courts in the sample (Santa Clara and Cook Counties)
account for slightly less than one-third (31%) of the
total cases and the general jurisdiction courts in multi-
tier court structures account for 26 percent of the
total caseload.
Across all of the courts, slightly less than two-thirds
(64%) of the cases are contract disputes with the
remainder of the civil caseload consisting of small
claims (16%), other civil (9%),53 tort (7%), unknown
case type (4%),54 and real property (1%). One of the
most striking features is that contract cases comprise
at least half of the civil caseloads across all three types
of court structures, although there are some notable
dierences. For example, in addition to having the
largest volume of cases overall, limited jurisdiction
courts have the highest proportion of small claims
cases (30%) and the lowest proportion of contract
cases (50%). It is highly likely that many of those small
claims cases are, in fact, lower-value debt collection
cases (a subcategory of contract cases) that were led
as small claims cases to take advantage of simplied
procedures. Tort cases have a much higher concen-
tration in general jurisdiction courts of multi-tier court
structures than in limited jurisdiction courts. This is
likely due to claims for monetary damages exceeding
the maximum thresholds for limited jurisdiction courts
in personal injury cases.
Small claims cases constituted only six percent of the
caseload in counties with single-tier courts, which
is due mainly to the small proportion of small claims
cases in Cook County.55 In Santa Clara County, small
claims accounted for 18 percent of the total civil
caseload. Interestingly, the monetary limit on small
claims cases is $10,000 in both Santa Clara and Cook
Findings
53 “Other ci vil” includes appeals from admi nistrative agencies and c ases involving c riminal or dome stic-related mat ters (e.g., civil stalking
petitions, grand jury matters, habeas petitions, and bond claims).
54 Nearly a ll of the unk nown cases (99%) were l ed in six of the 12 municipa l courts in Cuyahoga County. Because the other six cour ts indi cated
multiple case types, and their ca seload c omposition var ied acro ss cour ts, NCSC sta were unwilling to infer case t ypes fo r this ana lysis.
55 Small claims data were not included wi th the Cook County dataset, but Illinois case load and statistical repo rts ind icate that s mall claims lings
and disp ositio ns accou nt for approximatel y 5 percent of the civil caseload in the C ook County Supe rior Court. Cas eload and Statistical Reports,
CASELOAD SUMMARIES BY CIRCUIT, CIRCUIT COURTS OF ILLINOIS, CALENDAR YEAR 2012 at 17.
UNKNOWN
Table 2: Caseload Composition, by Court Type
Single Tier Courts 287,131 80 10 1 6 4 0
General Jurisdiction Courts 221,150 69 13 2 1 15 0
Limited Jurisdiction Courts 417,063 50 3 0 30 10 7
Total 925,344 64 7 1 16 9 3
TOTAL CIVIL
CASES
PERCENTAGE OF
CONTRACT TORT
REAL
PROPERTY
SMALL
CLAIMS
OTHER
CIVIL

18
Counties, which is considerably higher than both the
average limit for counties with multi-tiered court struc-
tures ($5,938) and the actual limit in all but two of the
eight counties. For some reason that may be unique to
Cook County, rather than to single-tier courts gener-
ally, litigants opt to le lower-value contract cases as
contract cases rather than as small claims cases.56
Table 3, however, documents some striking varia-
tions across counties. For example, the proportion of
contract cases in Marion County, Indiana is only eight
percent compared to an overall caseload average of
64 percent while small claims comprise 82 percent of
the civil caseload compared to the 16 percent overall
average. In Marion County, many creditors le debt
collection actions in the Marion County Small Claims
Courts, ostensibly due to perceptions that those
courts are a more attractive venue for plaintis.57 The
proportion of contract cases in Cuyahoga County is
also much lower (39%) than the overall average.58
The counties participating in this study did not consis-
tently describe case types with more detailed subcat-
egories, but most broke down caseloads for case
types of particular local interest. Those breakdowns
provide additional information about civil caseloads.
56 Illinoi s does not p ermit corporations to initiate small claim s cases unless they are represented by an attorn ey, although a corporate
representative m ay appea r to defend a small cla ims case. IL SUP. CT. R. ART. II, R. 282(b). The cost of retaining an attor ney may negate the cost
advantage of ling in small claims court.
57 The Marion County Smal l Claims C ourts have been the focus of intense criticism for severa l years du e to concerns about venue shopping,
lack of due process for defendants in debt collection cases, and collusion between debt c ollection plaintis and Small Claims Court judges. See
Marisa Kwialkowski, Judges Ca ll for an End to Marion County’s Small Claims C ourt System, IndyStar (July 12, 2014) (http://www.indystar.com/
story/news/2014/07/12/judges-call- end-marion-countys-small-claims-court-system /12585307/). Debt colle ction procedures are also the basis
for a class action lawsuit alleging v iolati ons of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. Suesz v. Med-1 Solutions, LLC, 734 F.3d 684 (7th Cir. 2013).
A Small Claims Task Force appointed by the Supreme Court of Indiana and an evaluation by the NCSC have both recommended that the Mario n
County Small Claims Courts be in corporated into the Superi or Cour t to provid e appropriate oversight an d due process protections for litigants.
See JOHN DOER NER, MARION COUNTY, INDIANA, SMALL CL AIMS COURTS: FINA L REPORT (July 2014); INDIANA SMALL CLAIMS TASK
FORCE, REPORT ON THE MARION COUNTY SMALL CL AIMS COURTS (May 1, 2012).
58 It is likely that a large propor tion of the unknown casetypes in the six muni cipal courts from Cuyah oga County that di d not provide case-level
data are actually c ontract c ases.
Maricopa (AZ) 53,226 78 1 0 4 16 0
Santa Clara (CA) 27,503 64 9 2 18 7 0
Miami-Dade (FL) 156,096 64 8 1 25 2 0
Oahu (HI) 22,363 64 5 0 0 30 0
Cook (IL) 259,628 82 10 1 5 3 0
Marion (IN) 75,834 8 2 0 82 8 0
Bergen (NJ) 64,068 60 8 0 4 27 0
Cuyahoga (OH) 76,970 39 7 0 6 9 38
Allegheny (PA) 34,011 55 8 2 32 4 0
Harris (TX) 155,645 72 7 1 3 16 0
Total 925,344 64 7 1 16 9 3
Table 3: Caseload Composition, by County
UNKNOWN
TOTAL CIVIL
CASES
PERCENTAGE OF
CONTRACT TORT
REAL
PROPERTY
SMALL
CLAIMS
OTHER
CIVIL
COUNTY (STATE)

19
Figures 7 and 8 illustrate the caseload composi-
tion for common subcategories of contract and tort
caseloads. Contract caseloads consist primarily of
debt collection (37%), landlord/tenant (29%), and
foreclosure (17%), cases.59 Tort caseloads consist
primarily of automobile tort (40%) and other personal
injury/property damages cases (20%).60 Although
medical malpractice and product liability cases often
generate a great deal of attention and criticism, they
comprise only ve percent of tort caseloads (less than
1% of the total civil caseload).
CASE DISPOSITIONS
Documenting how civil cases are actually resolved
is somewhat challenging due to varying disposition
descriptions among case management systems. As
discussed previously, courts traditionally record the
procedural signicance of the disposition in the case
management system rather than the actual manner of
disposition. Consequently, a case may be recorded as
“dismissed” for a variety of reasons such as an admin-
istrative dismissal for failure to prosecute, upon motion
59 Landlord/tenant case s includ e claims for both eviction and collection of past due rent p ayments.
60 “Persona l injur y/proper ty damage” ree cts a char acteristic of the type of damages rath er than the legal claim upo n which re lief is requested.
Conseq uently, that te rm is not recognize d as a unique case type by the NC SC State Court Guide. Nevertheless, that term is used by many
courts, including courts in eight of the 10 counties participating in the Landscape study. Although the term is ove r-inclusive, it likely includes
premises liability and other negligence cases.
Figure 7: Subcategories of Contract Cases
Debt Collection* 37%
Landlord/Tenant** 29%
Foreclosure*** 17%
* Not Reported by Santa Clara County
** Not reported by Marion County
*** Not reported by Santa Clara and Cu yahoga Counties
Automobile Tort* 40%
Other PI/PD** 20%
Medical Malpractice*** 3%
Products Liability+ 2%
Figure 8: Subcategories of Tort Cases
* Not repor ted by Marion County
** Not reported by Marion and Alleg heny Cou nties
***Not Reported by Santa Clara and M arion Counties
+ Not repor ted by Maricopa, Santa Clara and Marion Counties

20
by a litigant for withdrawal or non-suit, or upon notice
that the parties have settled the case. Similarly, a case
disposed by “judgment” may indicate either a default
judgment or an adjudication on the merits in a bench
or jury trial. Some of the courts in the Landscape
study employed more descriptive disposition codes
that provide guidance about the manner of dispo-
sition. For example, a dismissal with prejudice often
indicates that the parties have settled the case while
a dismissal without prejudice generally indicates either
withdrawal or an administrative dismissal. Cases
adjudicated on the merits usually had some notation
to that eect (e.g., judgment from jury trial, judgment
from nonjury trial, arbitration judgment). Nevertheless,
the lack of consistency across counties with respect
to the data denitions and the lack of descriptive-
ness for disposition codes undermines the reliability
of precise estimates, especially when compared to
earlier studies such as the 1992 Civil Justice Survey of
State Courts. For this study, the NCSC coded dispo-
sitions as follows:
• Dismissal: cases recorded as withdrawal,
dismissed, or dismissed without prejudice;
• Judgment (unspecied): cases recorded
as judgment;
• Default judgment: cases recorded as
default judgment;
• Settlement: cases recorded as settlement,
agreed judgment, stipulated judgment or
dismissal with prejudice;
• Summary judgment: cases recorded as
summary judgment;
• Adjudicated disposition: cases recorded as
disposed by jury trial, directed verdict, bench
trial, or arbitration;
• Other disposition: cases recorded as change of
venue, removal, transferred or bankruptcy stay;
and
• Unknown disposition: cases without a
specied disposition.
Keeping these caveats in mind concerning the reliabil-
ity of disposition rates, Figure 9 reects the overall
disposition breakdown based on this categorization.
Dismissals were the single largest proportion of dispo-
sitions, accounting for more than one-third (35%)
of the total caseload. Judgments (unspecied) and
default judgments were the second and third largest
Dismissed 35%
Judgment (unspecied) 26%
Default judgment 20%
Settlement 10%
Unknown 4%
Adjudicated disposition 4%
Other disposition 1%
Summary judgment 1%
Figure 9: Case Dispositions (all cases)

21
61 See Figure 2, supra, at p. 7.
62 In 2012, more than half of new civil cases were led in limited jurisdic tion cou rts. R. L AFOUN TAIN ET AL., EX AMINING THE WORK OF
STATE COURTS: AN OVERVIE W OF 2012 STATE TRIAL C OURT CASELOADS 8 (NCSC 2014).
63 The default rate in the 1992 C ivil Justi ce Sur vey of State Courts was 14 percent.
64 The Cook County Ci rcuit Court did not include default judgment as a disposition type at all.
Table 4: Percentage of Case Dispositions by Court Type
SINGLE TIER GENERAL JURISDICTION LIMITED JURISDICTION ALL COURTS
Dismissed 31 36 37 35
Judgment (unspecied) 50 15 16 26
Default judgment 3 18 32 20
Settlement 13 12 6 10
Adjudicated disposition 1 4 5 4
Unknown 0 13 2 4
Summary judgment 0 1 1 1
Other disposition 1 2 1 1
categories, at 26 percent and 20 percent respectively.
Settlements comprised only 10 percent of dispo-
sitions. Four percent of cases were adjudicated on
the merits and only one percent were disposed by
summary judgment. These disposition rates are a
dramatic change from the 1992 Civil Justice Survey
of State Courts.61 The dismissal rate is more than
three times higher and the default rate is 42 percent
higher in the Landscape study. The settlement rate,
in contrast, is less than one-fth of the 1992 study.
Adjudicated dispositions also declined from six percent
to four percent.
Some of these dierences may reect dierences in
how these studies were conducted. The 1992 survey
examined civil cases disposed in the general juris-
diction courts of 45 large, urban counties. Although
all of the counties selected for the Landscape study
participated in the 1992 Civil Justice Survey of State
Courts, the Landscape study also collected data
from the limited jurisdiction courts in those counties,
which accounts for almost half (43%) of the total
caseload.62 Table 4 suggests that some of the dier-
ence in disposition rates may be the result of dier-
ences in the respective caseloads of limited jurisdic-
tion and general jurisdiction courts. Approximately
one-third of the cases in the limited jurisdiction courts
(32%) were disposed by default judgment, but only
18 percent of the general jurisdiction court cases
were default judgments.63 The default rate for single-
tier courts was three percent, which is unrealistically
low and it is likely that a substantial majority of the
unspecied judgments for single-tier courts (51%) are
actually default judgments.64 Settlement rates in the
single-tier and general jurisdiction courts (13% and
12%, respectively) are two times the settlement rate
in the limited jurisdiction court (6%), but all are still
much lower than the 62 percent settlement rate in the
1992 Civil Justice Survey of State Courts. It is likely
that a substantial proportion of cases disposed by

22
dismissal are also settlements rather than withdrawals
or administrative dismissals.65 Surprisingly, adjudica-
tion rates are highest in the limited jurisdiction courts
(5% compared to 4% in general jurisdiction courts
and 1% in single-tier courts), but two-thirds (66%)
of the adjudicated dispositions are bench trials in
contract, other civil, and small claims cases in limited
jurisdiction courts.
In addition to dierences in courts included the
samples, the coding methodology employed in the
two studies diered. Data for the 1992 Civil Justice
Survey was collected through personal inspection of
individual case les rather than extraction from the case
management systems. Consequently, the 1992 data
are more accurate and precise than the Landscape
data. It is particularly dicult to interpret the dismissal
and unspecied judgment rates in the Landscape
dataset. Generally, litigants will request that settled
cases be dismissed with prejudice to preclude the
plainti from reling the case in the future. Cases with
that designation were classied as settlements in the
Landscape dataset, but some cases may have been
coded by court sta only as dismissals in the case
management system, which would result in an inated
dismissal rate. Similarly, unspecied judgments may
include a substantial proportion of cases that were
actually default judgments.
Finally, the current study was undertaken shortly after
this country’s most signicant economic recession
since the Great Depression, during which state courts
experienced a spike in civil case lings, especially in
debt collection and mortgage foreclosure cases.66
The disposition rates may reect the unique economic
and scal circumstances of state court caseloads
during this period rather than more general trends.
Table 5, which describes case dispositions by case
type, documents substantially higher default judgment
rates for contract and small claims cases (21% and
32%, respectively). Tort cases, in contrast, had
substantially higher settlement and dismissal rates
(32% and 39%, respectively). Real property, small
claims, and other civil cases were the most likely to
be adjudicated on the merits (6% for real property and
other civil cases, 10% for small claims cases).
65 Cases dis missed for failu re to prosec ute averag ed ve percent amo ng the 17 courts in seven co unties that separately identied these cases, but ranged
as high as 14 perc ent in the g eneral jurisdiction courts. Even if all of the dismissals in the gene ral juri sdiction cour ts were set tleme nts, it woul d only bring the
settle ment rate to 34 percent (app roximately 55% of the 1992 settle ment rate).
66 LAFOUNTAIN, supra note 62, at 4.
Table 5: Proportion of Case Dispositions by Case Type
CONTR ACT TORT REAL PROPERT Y SMALL CLAIMS OTHER ALL CASES
Dismissed 33 39 37 47 31 35
Judgment (unspecied) 31 11 23 10 25 26
Default judgment 21 4 13 32 7 20
Settlement 7 32 12 2 19 10
Unknown 3 8 5 0 11 4
Adjudicated disposition 3 3 6 7 6 4
Other disposition 1 3 2 1 1 1
Summary judgment 1 1 3 0 0 1

23
Collectively, these factors suggest that the actual
dierences in disposition rates may be less dramatic
than indicated by the dierences between Figure 2
and Figure 9, but it is unlikely that they account for the
entire dierence. Compared to two decades ago, it
seems likely that more civil cases are being disposed
in a largely administrative capacity (dismissals or
default judgments), resulting in lower overall settle-
ment rates. With the exception of cases led in limited
jurisdiction courts, in which contract, other civil and
small claims collectively comprise 40 percent of the
total civil caseload, very little formal adjudication is
taking place in state courts at all.
CASE OUTCOMES AND JUDGMENT AMOUNTS
The Landscape courts were not able to provide data
documenting which party prevailed in cases that
resulted in a judgment, so we are only able to infer
case outcomes based on whether the judgment
included a damage award. This is an imprecise
measurement insofar that some judgments in which
the plainti prevailed will include only equitable rather
than monetary relief.67
By the same token, a judgment in which the defen-
dant prevailed on both the original claim as well as
a counterclaim against the plainti will also reect a
monetary award.68 Recall also from Tables 4 and
5 that only 46 percent of cases were disposed by
judgment (26% judgment (unspecied), 20% default
judgment), and that rate varied considerably by case
type. Only 15 percent of tort cases were disposed by
judgment compared to 65 percent of small claims, 56
percent of contract cases, 45 percent of real property
cases, and 32 percent of other civil cases. Figure 10
provides the proportion of judgments greater than
zero, which may be interpreted as a very rough proxy
for the plainti win rate. Given the factors discussed
above, however, these rates likely underestimate the
actual rate at which plaintis prevailed, but it is not
known by how much. The estimated rates are likely
to be considerably more accurate for small claims
and contract cases in which the proportion of cases
disposed by judgment is higher.
For the most part, the monetary values at issue in
state court civil cases are relatively modest, at least
67 A substantial proporti on of real property case s, for example, involve disputed property boundaries. Judgments in such cases would
determi ne the boundaries, but would not ordinarily award monetary damages unless th e complaint alleged othe r claims (e.g., trespass). Th e Civil
Justice Su rvey of State Courts series excluded cases involving equitable claims, so it is unknown what propo rtion of cases involve onl y claims
seeking legal remedies.
68 Eight perc ent of the tr ials in th e 2005 Civ il Justice Survey of S tate Cour ts involved cross claims or third-party claims. Of those cases, the
defendant prevailed in 39 pe rcent of th e trials. 2005 Civil Justice S urvey of State Cour ts (data on l e with the authors).
Figure 10: Proportion of Cases in which Judgment Exceeded $0
Small Claims 57%
Contract 42%
Other Civil 26%
Tort 11%
Real Property 4%

24
in cases resulting in a formal judgment. Table 6 shows
the average amount and the interquartile range69 of the
nal award for cases resulting in a judgment greater
than zero by court type, case type, and manner of
disposition.70 Overall, the average judgment award
was less than $10,000 and the interquartile range was
just $1,273 (25th percentile) to $5,154 (75th percen-
tile). Not surprisingly, these values were lowest in
limited jurisdiction courts, ostensibly due to the lower
monetary thresholds for those courts. General juris-
diction courts had the highest judgment awards, while
judgment amounts for single-tier courts, which manage
all civil cases for their respective jurisdictions, predict-
ably fell in between. Although some cases resulted in
extremely large judgments,71 they comprised only a
small percentage of judgments greater than zero. For
example, only 357 cases (0.2%) had judgments that
exceeded $500,000 and only 165 cases (less than
0.1%) had judgments that exceeded $1 million.
69 The interquarti le range is the value of judgment awards at the 25th, 50th, and 75th percentiles. Because the mean (average) is of ten skewed
by extreme outliers, the inte rquar tile range reects a more acc urate picture of the value of typ ical cases for each catego ry.
70 Moneta ry dam ages were reported for les s than half (41%) of cases that resulted in a nal judgment. These cases comp rise 25 percent of the
entire Landscape caseload.
71 The largest judgment recorded in the Landscape data was $84.5 million awarded in a contract case dis posed in the Circuit Cour t of
Cook Cou nty, Illino is. The case involved a dispute between a pharmaceutical company and its insure r concerning lo sses suered by the
pharmaceutical company due to a drug recall. At issue wa s whethe r the phar maceutical company was covered under its insuranc e policy, or
whether that coverage was previousl y rescinded. The trial cou rt judgment in favor of the pharmace utical company was subsequently upheld by
the Illin ois Court of Appeals. Ce rtain Under writers at Lloyds, London v. Abbott Laboratories, 16 N.E.3d 747 (Ill. App. 2014).
Table 6: Judgment Amounts Exceeding $0*
INTERQUARTILE RANGE
N MEAN 25TH 50TH 75TH
Overall 227,812 $9,267 $1,273 $2,441 $5,154
Court Type
General Jurisdiction 19,237 $24,117 $2,270 $5,592 $14,273
Single Tier 64,894 $18,023 $1,685 $3,029 $6,291
Limited Jurisdiction 143,681 $3,325 $1,060 $1,956 $4,085
Case Type
Real Property 102 $157,651 $2,181 $12,789 $105,822
Tort 3,554 $64,761 $2,999 $6,000 $12,169
Other 9,704 $12,349 $749 $2,002 $4,219
Contract 160,465 $9,428 $1,251 $2,272 $4,981
Small Claims 39,517 $4,503 $1,568 $3,000 $6,000
Disposition Type
Summary judgment 1,187 $133,411 $3,200 $6,174 $15,198
Adjudicated disposition 11,341 $15,088 $675 $1,120 $2,000
Judgment (unspecied) 96,037 $11,312 $1,340 $2,525 $5,302
Default Judgment 107,524 $5,876 $1,312 $2,442 $5,305
* Categories sor ted in descending order based on the mean judgment amount.

25
With respect to case types, average judgments
awarded in real property cases were the highest overall
($157,651), followed by torts ($64,761), other civil
cases ($12,349), contracts ($9,428), and small claims
($4,503). Although average judgments in real property
cases were the highest of all of the case types, they
comprised only a fraction (0.5%) of the total cases in
which a judgment was entered; contracts and small
claims cases comprised 82 percent of the caseload in
which a judgment was entered, and 88 percent of the
cases in which the judgment exceeded zero.
The monetary value of judgments is considerably lower
than one would imagine from listening to debates about
the contemporary justice system and largely conrms
allegations that the costs of litigation routinely exceed
the value of the case. In 2013, the NCSC developed a
methodology — the Civil Litigation Cost Model (CLCM)
— to estimate legal fees and expert witness fees in
civil cases.72 Using the CLCM, the NCSC found that
in most types of civil cases, the median cost per side
to litigate a case from ling through trial ranged from
approximately $43,000 for automobile tort cases to
$122,000 for professional malpractice cases. Indeed,
in many cases the cost of litigation likely outstrips the
monetary value of the case shortly after initiating the
lawsuit.73 Debt collection cases were the only excep-
tion. In a study of Utah attorneys using the CLCM, the
NCSC found that the median cost per side to litigate
a debt collection case through trial was $2,698.74
Given the median judgment amount, most plaintis
would nd it economically feasible to pursue these
claims, but not most defendants. There is, moreover,
a fairly wide gap between the actual costs involved in
resolving civil disputes and litigant expectations about
what those costs should be. In 1999, for example,
the New Mexico Judicial Branch conducted a series
of public opinion polls, focus groups, and litigant
surveys to measure the gap between the costs that
litigants believe are reasonable and the actual costs
in civil cases.75 Litigants reported that the estimate of
a reasonable cost for resolving their case was $3,682
on average, but actual costs were $8,385.76
BENCH AND JURY TRIALS
Courts reported a total of 32,124 trials as case dispo-
sitions in the Landscape dataset, 1,109 of which were
jury trials (3%) and 31,015 were bench trials (97%).77
Collectively, they comprised less than four percent of
the entire Landscape dataset (0.1% jury trials, 3.4%
bench trials). Jury trials were distributed about equally
in the single-tier and general jurisdiction courts (49%
and 45%, respectively) with only seven percent of
jury trials taking place in limited jurisdiction courts.
In contrast, limited jurisdiction and single-tier courts
disproportionately conducted bench trials (45% and
42%, respectively) compared to only 13 percent in the
72 CASELOAD HIGHLIGHTS, supra note 9.
73 The costs per side associ ated with c ase initiation ra nged from approximately $2,40 0 in automo bile tor t cases to $7,300 in professional
malpractice and employment cases. Id.
74 See UTAH RULE 26 REPORT, supra note 32, at 46-48.
75 John M. Greacen, Ho w Fair, Fast, and Che ap Should Court s Be? 82 JUDICATURE 287 (May-June 1999).
76 Id. at 289.
77 The Miami-Dade Circuit and Count y Courts and the Marion Co unty Superior and Circu it Cour ts were not a ble to identify cases dis posed by
bench or jury trial. Data from the Cook Count y Circuit Court did not indicate cases disposed by ben ch trial. The trial rates ree ct only cases for
courts that identied bench and j ury trials.

26
general jurisdiction courts. As Figures 11 and 12 illus-
trate, over three times as many jury trials took place in
tort trials (65%) as in other types of cases. Over half
of all bench trials (51%) took place in contract cases,
followed by other civil cases (27%), small claims (19%),
tort (2%), and real property cases (1%).
Only 69 percent of the jury trials and 58 percent of the
bench trials in the Landscape dataset included infor-
mation about the nal judgment amount. As noted
previously, some of the bench trials may have involved
equitable relief, which would explain the absence of a
damage award. In other instances, judgment awards
Other Civil
27%
Other Civil
17%
Small Claims
1%
Real Property
2%
Contract
15%
Figure 11: Proportion of Jury Trials by Case Type
Figure 12: Proportion of Bench Trials by Case Type
Tort
65%
Tort
2%
Contract
51%
Real Property
1%
Small Claims
19%

27
Table 7: Jury Trials, Judgment Amounts Exceeding $0*
INTERQUARTILE RANGE
N MEAN 25TH 50TH 75TH
Total 194 $ 1,468,554 $7,962 $31,097 $201,896
Case Type
Real Property 6 $947,589 $175,522 $370,199 $2,764,839
Contract 43 $226,635 $10,012 $48,806 $257,600
Tort 134 $2,003,776 $8,845 $30,000 $151,961
Other 9 $106,412 $2,193 $5,000 $139,232
Small Claims 2 $2,510 $1,621 $2,510 $3,400
Table 8: Bench Trials, Judgment Amounts Exceeding $0*
INTERQUARTILE RANGE
N MEAN 25TH 50TH 75TH
Total 1 1,481 $6,408 $679 $1,131 $2,028
Case Type
Real Property 5 $19,277 $ 4,259 $7,826 $37,500
Tort 53 $7,300 $3,443 $8,629 $14,385
Small Claims 730 $2,749 $827 $2,000 $3,900
Other 1,498 $2,638 $200 $1,339 $3,664
Contract 9,195 $7,300 $700 $1,098 $1,785
* Categories sor ted in descending order based on 75th percentil e.
78 Courts that provided jud gment amount for cases dis posed by trial included Cook County Circuit Cour t (jury trials only); Allegheny Cour t of
Common Pleas; Bergen County Supe rior Court; Maricopa C ounty Superior Cour t; the Euclid and Gar eld Heights Municipal Cour ts in Cuyahoga
County; Harris County Justice Court; and the Maricopa County Justice Court.
were not included in the case-level data.78 Tables 7
and 8 provide the average (mean) judgment award
by case type for jury and bench trials in which the
reported judgment was greater than zero. Those data
highlight some important dierences between bench
and jury trials. First, the damage awards in jury trials
are 48 or more times greater than those in bench trials
for all case types except small claims. This suggests
that litigants engage in signicant case selection strat-
egies when deciding whether to try a case to a judge
or jury. Tort cases, especially those involving more
serious injuries and/or more egregious negligence on

28
the part of the defendant that might warrant punitive
damages are much more likely to be tried by a jury.
Cases in which there is only limited potential for higher
damage awards are more likely to be disposed by
bench trial because the costs associated with a jury
trial will exceed the potential award.
Second, the average jury and bench awards are
heavily skewed by a very small number outlier cases.
For example, compared to a mean jury award of $2
million in tort cases, 50 percent of jury awards in tort
cases were $30,000 or less, and 75 percent of jury
awards in tort cases were less than $152,000. Jury
awards exceeded $500,000 in only 17 cases (3%
of cases in which judgment exceeded zero), and
exceeded $1 million in only 13 cases (2%).79 The
average judgment awarded in bench trials ($6,408)
was three times more than the judgment awarded at
the 75th percentile ($2,028).
Another noteworthy consideration concerning bench
and jury trials is number of trials involving self-repre-
sented litigants. In the 1992 Civil Justice Survey of
State Courts, attorneys represented both parties in 97
percent of jury trials and 91 percent of bench trials.
In the trials from the Landscape dataset, the propor-
tion of trials in which both parties were represented
decreased to 87 percent of jury trials and 24 percent
of bench trials. Restricting the analysis to general juris-
diction courts (for better comparability with the 1992
Civil Justice Survey) does not measurably improve the
picture. Except for tort trials, defendants had repre-
sentation in less than 30 percent of bench trials. In tort
cases, plaintis were represented in 69 percent and
defendants were represented in 71 percent of bench
trials, resulting in only 56 percent of bench trials with
both sides represented. The costs associated with
bringing a case to trial may be a factor in the relatively
high proportion of bench trials involving self-repre-
sented litigants in general jurisdiction courts.
TIME TO DISPOSITION
The average time from ling to disposition for cases in
the Landscape dataset was 306 days (approximately
10 months); the interquartile range was 35 to 372
days (approximately 1 month to just over 1 year). Table
9 documents the average disposition time as well as
the interquartile range for disposition. On average,
tort cases took the longest time to resolve (486 days),
followed by real property cases (428 days), other civil
cases (323 days), contract claims (309 days), and
small claims (175 days).
Some cases in the Landscape dataset had unusually
long disposition times. A total of 1,252 cases (0.1%)
were 10 years or older when they were nally disposed.
Of the 521 cases that were 15 years or older, more
than half were foreclosure cases led in the Bergen
County Superior Court. The second oldest case in the
dataset, People’s Trust of New Jersey v. Garra, led in
1972 and administratively closed in 2013 (41 years),
was one of these, although case records suggest that
the case was actually resolved in 1998 (26 years).
The oldest case was a guardianship case (coded as
“Other Civil—Domestic Related”), led in the Marion
County Superior Court in 1950 (62 years).80
Addressing court delay has been a major focus of
court improvement eorts for several decades. The
most recent national eort to manage civil caseloads
in a timely manner was a component of the Model
Time Standards for State Trial Courts. The Model Time
Standards recommend that 75 percent of general civil
cases be disposed within 180 days, 90 percent within
365 days, and 98 percent within 540 days.81
79 The highest jur y award in the Landscape dataset was $80 million, awa rded in a premises l iability case involving an iron wo rker who b ecome
paraly zed from the neck down after falling h eadrst from a steel beam while not using a safet y harne ss. Bayer v. Garbe Iron Wor ks, Inc. et al.,
No. 07-L-009877 (Cook Cir. Ct., Dec. 17, 2012). The trial judge subseq uently reduced the $8 0 million verdict to $64 mill ion.
80 The State Cou rt Gui de recommends that guardi anship and other c ases in which an in itial entry of judgment is led, but a re then rev iewed on
a periodic basis by a judici al ocer, be coded in the c ase management system as “set for review” rather than leaving the case as “pending” or
“open” on the court docket to avoid distor ting disposition time statistics. STATE COURT GUIDE, supra note 49, at 4.
81 MODEL TIME STANDARDS, supra note 41.

29
Table 9: Time to Disposition (days)*
INTERQUARTILE RANGE
N MEAN 25TH 50TH 75TH
Overall 820,893 306 35 113 372
Court Type
General Jurisdiction 206,209 410 50 215 546
Single Tier 247,815 366 45 148 491
Limited Jurisdiction 366,869 206 23 72 219
Case Type
Tort 60,460 486 165 340 640
Real Property 5,745 428 102 297 573
Other 79,077 323 26 160 401
Contract 553,271 309 28 107 371
Small Claims 110,274 175 39 70 169
Disposition Type
Settlement 84,992 478 78 267 650
Summary judgment 5,812 441 185 321 574
Dismissal 293,466 391 49 195 544
Other disposition 7,819 323 57 149 374
Unknown disposition 16,740 316 64 147 373
Judgment (unspecied) 229,634 264 19 68 302
Adjudicated disposition 27,281 147 13 21 167
Default Judgment 155,149 132 36 70 159
* Categories sor ted in descending order based on 75th percentil e.

30
Table 10: Cases Disposed within Model Time Standard Guidelines*
PERCENTAGE DISPOSED WITHIN
N 180 DAYS 365 DAYS 540 DAYS
Overall 820,893 59 75 82
Court Type
Limited Jurisdiction 366,869 71 84 89
Single Tier 247,815 54 69 77
General Jurisdiction 206,209 45 64 75
Case Type
Small Claims 110,274 76 88 92
Other Civil 79,077 53 73 81
Contract 553,271 61 75 81
Debt Collection 101,089 91 94 95
Foreclosure 240,115 14 36 51
Landlord/Tenant 90,495 68 87 92
Real Property 5,745 37 57 73
Tort 60,460 27 53 69
AutoTort 26,802 27 57 74
PI/PD 13,614 26 52 68
Product Liability 1,987 24 39 51
Medical Malpractice 1,332 21 36 46
Disposition Type
Default Judgment 155,149 79 94 97
Adjudicated disposition 27,281 76 88 93
Judgment (unspecied) 229,634 67 78 84
Unknown disposition 16,740 56 75 83
Other disposition 7,819 55 75 82
Dismissal 293,466 48 66 75
Summary judgment 5,812 24 56 73
Settlement 84,992 40 59 70
* Note: Categories sor ted in de scending order based on c ases disposed w ithin 540 days.
Generously speaking, it is clear from Table 10, which
documents the proportion of cases disposed within
these timeframes, that the Model Time Standards are
still an aspirational goal rather than a current achieve-
ment. Overall, only the limited jurisdiction courts come
close to meeting the Model Time Standards, with
71 percent of general civil cases disposed within 180
days, 84 percent within 365 days, and 89 percent
within 540 days. General jurisdiction courts fared the
worst with only 75 percent of cases disposed within
540 days.
Because contract cases comprise such a large
proportion of civil caseloads, they will necessarily
have an outsized eect on disposition times. Looking
closely at the dierent subcategories of contracts,
we nd that debt collection cases (37% of contracts)
are generally disposed quite quickly, with 91 percent
closed within 180 days and 95 percent within 540
days. However, foreclosures (17% of contracts) are
signicant contributors to overall delay in contract

31
long timeframes to close these cases (75% disposed
within 540 days) suggests that many of these may
have been settlements. Nevertheless, closer supervi-
sion of these cases might have improved compliance
with the Model Time Standards.
REPRESENTATION STATUS OF LITIGANTS
Most state court judges and court administrators can
attest that the representation status of civil litigants
has changed dramatically since the publication of
the 1992 Civil Justice Survey of State Courts.83 In
that study, attorneys represented both plaintis and
defendants in 95% of the cases disposed in general
jurisdiction courts. This high level of attorney repre-
sentation existed across case types; both parties were
represented by attorneys in 98 percent of tort cases,
94 percent of contract cases, and 93 percent of real
property cases. While plaintis remained overwhelm-
ingly represented by counsel (92%) in the Landscape
dataset, the average representation for defendants
was 26 percent and the average percentage of cases
in which both sides were represented by counsel
was only 24 percent (see Table 11). As before, there
are some striking variations across court types, case
types, and disposition types.
Cases led in general jurisdiction courts provide the
most accurate comparison of the 1992 Civil Justice
Survey of State Courts and the Landscape datasets.
Although attorney representation for plaintis has
declined only slightly (from 99% to 96%), attorney
representation for defendants has decreased by more
than half (97% to 46%), resulting in a commensu-
cases.82 Only 14 percent were disposed within 180
days, and slightly more than half (51%) within 540
days. Landlord/tenant cases similarly did not meet the
Model Time Standards guidelines, although they fared
considerably better than mortgage foreclosures.
Although tort cases comprise only seven percent of
the Landscape dataset, they were the worst case
category in terms of compliance with the Model Time
Standards. Only two-thirds (69%) were disposed within
540 days. Automobile torts performed somewhat
better (74% disposed within 540 days) than other
subcategories of torts. Less than half of the medical
malpractice and product liability cases were disposed
by 540 days, ostensibly due to their evidentiary and
legal complexity. Perhaps the most surprising of the
disposition time analysis is the fact that even small
claims cases did not fully comply with the Model Time
Standards, although they came closer than any other
broad case type. Small claims slightly exceeded the
Model Time Standards guidelines for cases disposed
within 180 days (76%), but then lost ground for cases
disposed within 365 days (88%) and 540 days (92%).
The manner of disposition may also explain some
of the longer disposition times. Cases disposed by
summary judgment and settlement, which necessar-
ily would be characterized by longer discovery and
pretrial litigation activity, were the least likely to have
closed within 540 days (73% and 70%, respectively).
In contrast, almost all (97%) of the cases disposed by
default judgment closed within 540 days. Although
some of the dismissals were undoubtedly administra-
tive dismissals for failure to prosecute, the relatively
82 Mortgage foreclosures were a substantial factor in the s pike in civil lings following the 2008-2009 economic recession. U.S. CENSUS
BUREAU, STATISTICAL ABSTRACT OF THE UNITED STATES: 2012, Table 1194: Mortgage Origin ations and Delinqu ency and Foreclosure
Rates: 1990-2010. Many state cour ts found themselves overwh elmed by the volume of foreclosure lin gs, including the Miami-Dade Circuit
Court and the Maricopa C ounty Superior Cour t. Subseq uent complications related to mor tgage servicing company record-keeping and internal
foreclosure procedures may accou nt for some of the delays appare nt in these cases. Joe Adler, OCC O ers Updates on Comp liance wi th
Foreclosure Settlement, AMERICAN BANKER (April 30, 2014) available at http://www.americanbanker.com/issues/179_83/occ-oers-update-
on-com pliance-with-foreclosure-settlement-1067226-1.html, last vis ited on Aug. 24, 2015; Kate Berr y, Robo-Si gning Re dux: Ser vicers Still
Fabricating Foreclosure Documents, AMERICAN BANKER (Aug. 31, 2011) available at http://www.americanbanker.com/issues/176_170/robo-
signing-foreclosure-mortgage-assignments-1041741-1.html?BCnopagination=1&gclid=CMWK-MmXwscCFcEUHwod0X4LRw, last visited on
Aug. 24, 2015.
83 The 1992 Civil Justice Survey of State C ourts m easure d representatio n status ba sed on whether any party was represented by co unsel at
any time during the litigati on. The NCSC State Court Guide to Statistical Reporting now recommends that representation status be me asured
based on w hether a party was self-represented either at any time du ring the l ife of the ca se or, if the case manage ment system does not capture
that information, at disposition. COURT STATISTICS PROJECT, supra note 52, at 31-32. The Landscape study employed the State Court Guide
methodology to mea sure representation status. As a result of th e diering denitions, the 1992 Civil Justic e Survey of S tate Cour ts statistics on
representation status may inate the proportion of liti gants who were represented by c ounsel.

32
Tabl e 11: Representation Status (Percentage of Cases)*
ATTORNEY REPRESENTING
N** PLAINTIFF DEFENDANT BOTH
Overall 649,811 92 26 24
Court Type
General Jurisdiction 200,789 96 46 45
Limited Jurisdiction 201,194 86 22 17
Single Tier 247,828 91 19 11
Case Type
Tort 60,358 96 67 64
Real Property 4,970 95 45 39
Other 38,010 78 36 25
Contract 453,115 95 23 20
Small Claims 98,176 76 13 13
Disposition Type
Summary judgment 5,266 99 62 61
Other disposition 6,428 96 54 49
Unknown disposition 27,491 93 45 42
Settlement 64,435 92 40 37
Adjudicated disposition 6,106 64 38 37
Dismissal 231,730 92 33 31
Judgment (unspecied) 205,202 90 19 16
Default Judgment 108,150 91 7 5
* Categories sor ted in descending order based on both parties repre sented by counsel.
** Numbe r of cases in cour ts that reported re presentation status for both parti es.
84 Lawyer s were permitted to represent clients in small claims cases in seven of the 10 counties that participated in th e Landscape study: Cook
County Circuit Court, Miami-Dade County Court, Oahu District Court, Harris County Justice Courts, Marion County Small Claims Court, Bergen
County Superi or Cour t, and the 12 muni cipal courts located in Cuyahoga County, Ohio.

33
rate decrease in cases with attorney representation
for both sides (96% to 45%). Not surprisingly, limited
jurisdiction courts had the lowest proportion of plain-
ti representation (86%), but single-tier courts had the
lowest proportion of both defendant representation
(13%) and overall litigant representation (11%).
Tort cases had the highest proportion of attorney
representation overall (64%) and were the only case
catagory in which more than half of defendants were
represented (67%). Attorney representation was lowest
in small claims cases (both sides represented in 13%
of cases), which was expected given that these calen-
dars were originally developed as a forum for self-rep-
resented litigants to obtain access to courts through
simplied procedures. What was surprising, however,
was the higher than expected proportion of small
claims cases in which plaintis were represented by
counsel (76%). This suggests that small claims courts
may have become the forum of choice for many debt
collection cases.84 If so, it raises troubling concerns
that small claims courts, which were originally devel-
oped as a forum in which primarily self-represented
litigants could use a simplied process to resolve civil
cases quickly and fairly, provide a much less evenly
balanced playing eld than was originally intended.
The Landscape data are insuciently detailed to draw
rm conclusions about the impact of attorney repre-
sentation in any given case, but it is clear that it does
aect case dispositions. For example, cases disposed
by summary judgment had the highest proportions of
attorney representation (61% with both sides repre-
sented), and likely reects the fact that self-repre-
sented litigants would be less likely to le motions for
summary judgment. Defendants in cases resolved by
“other disposition” (e.g., bankruptcy stays, removal to
federal court, and change of venue) were represented
more than half the time (54%), again suggesting that
lawyers would be more aware of and inclined to take
advantage of these procedural options.

34

35
Conclusions and Implications for State Courts
The picture of contemporary litigation that emerges
from the Landscape dataset is very dierent from the
one suggested in debates about the contemporary civil
justice system. State court caseloads are dominated
by lower-value contract and small claims cases rather
than high-value commercial and tort cases. Only one in
four cases has attorneys representing both the plainti
and the defendant. In addition, only a tiny proportion
of cases are adjudicated on the merits, and almost all
of those are bench trials in lower-value contract, small
claims and other civil cases.
With rare exceptions, the monetary value of cases
disposed in state courts is quite modest. Seventy-ve
percent (75%) of judgments greater than zero were
less than $5,200. Only judgments in real property
cases exceeded $100,000 more than 25 percent of
the time. At the 75th percentile, judgments in small
claims cases were actually greater than judgments in
contract cases ($6,000 compared to $4,981). This is
particularly striking given recent estimates of the costs
of civil litigation. In the vast majority of cases, deciding
to litigate a typical civil case in state courts is econom-
ically unsound unless the litigant is prepared to do so
on a self-represented basis, which appears to be the
case for most defendants.
The relatively high proportion of self-represented
defendants in civil cases is also troubling. Much of
the civil justice system is designed with the assump-
tion that both parties will be represented by compe-
tent attorneys. The asymmetry of representation
between plaintis and defendants across all of the
case types — even in small claims courts — raises
serious questions about the substantive fairness of
outcomes in those cases.85 Although there has been
a sea change in state court policies with respect
to the legitimacy of court-supported assistance to
self-represented litigants, it is still a very controversial
topic in many states.86 Moreover, most of that assis-
tance takes the form of self-help forms and general
instructions for ling cases and gathering documents
in preparation for evidentiary hearings. As a general
rule, state codes of judicial ethics prohibit judges from
giving the appearance of providing assistance, much
less actually giving assistance, to a self-represented
litigant.87 This has certain implications with respect to
public trust and condence in the courts. The ideal-
ized view is that courts provide a forum in which civil
litigants can negotiate eectively to resolve disputes,
but also one in which Justice (with a capital J) will be
done if those negotiations fail. It is fair to question the
extent to which self-represented defendants are able
to bargain eectively with represented litigants given
unequal resources and expertise.
The economic realities of contemporary civil litiga-
tion suggest one explanation for the dominance of
contract and small claims cases, which comprise 80
percent of civil caseloads in the Landscape courts.
For plaintis in these cases, state courts essen-
tially function as a monopoly insofar that securing a
judgment from a court of competent jurisdiction is the
only legal mechanism for enforcing payment of the
award through post-judgment garnishment or asset
seizure proceedings. Even so, plaintis must gener-
ally wait months to secure the judgment before they
can initiate enforcement proceedings. The majority of
claims asserted in tort cases, in contrast, are likely to
involve insurance coverage for the defendant, which
provides greater incentives for litigants to settle claims
and a mechanism for judgments and settlement
agreements to be paid. Indeed, in the vast majority of
incidents giving rise to tort claims, the existence of a
robust and highly regulated insurance market largely
precludes the need to le cases in court at all.88
85 In 2010, the Federal Trade Commission published a report descri bing common prob lems invo lving unfair, deceptive, and abusive de bt
collection practices. FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION, PROTECTING CONSUMERS IN DEBT COLLECTION LITIGATION AND ARBITRATION
(July 2010). In response to consumer com plaints, the Consumer Fin ancial Protectio n Bureau recently published model rules a nd proce dures
for state courts de signed to curb the most frequently alleged abusive p ractices. CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU, PROPOSED
RULES, 78 FED. REG. 67,848 (Nov. 12, 2013) (to be codied at 12 C.F.R. pt. 1006).
86 DEBORAH SAUNDERS, ACCESS BRIEF: SELF-HELP SERVICES (NCSC 2012).
87 Jona Goldschmidt, Judicial Ethics and Assistance to Self-Represented Litigants, 28 JUST. SYS. J. 324 (2007).
88 As just one ex ample, th e Insurance Research Institute rep orts that of automobile insurance c laims closed in 2012, only eight perc ent
of claimants ultimately led suit in c ourt. INSURAN CE RESEA RCH INSTITUTE, COUNTRYWIDE PATTERNS IN TREATMENT, COST, AND
COMPENSATION (2014).

36
and jurisdictional authorities in state courts, which
make it extremely dicult to document the size of civil
caseloads, much less make accurate comparisons
across states.
In spite of distorted perceptions, state courts do have
serious problems managing civil cases. Of particular
concern is the extent to which costs and delay impede
access to justice. Procedural complexity is often cited
as a contributing cause of cost and delay, but recent
commentary suggests that uniform procedural rules
that treat all cases exactly the same regardless of the
complexity of the factual and legal issues underlying
the dispute may be a more signicant problem.89 Most
uniform rules place a great deal of discretion in the
hands of lawyers to determine the extent to which each
case should be litigated. The bar has largely resisted
proposals to restrict that discretion on grounds that
any individual case might need an exceptional amount
of time or attention to resolve and therefore all cases
should be managed as if they need that excep-
tional treatment. Courts that have imposed manda-
tory restrictions on lawyer discretion have tended to
generate considerable pushback including the use
of creative procedural techniques to exempt cases
from their application.90 Opt-in programs designed to
streamline case management have often failed due
to underuse.91 As the ndings from the Landscape
dataset make clear, however, very few cases need as
much time or attention as the rules provide and, ironi-
cally, many of them likely take longer and cost more to
resolve as a result.
Another contributor to cost and delay is the tradi-
tional practice of allowing the litigants, rather than the
court, to control the pace of litigation. Proponents
DISTORTED PERCEPTIONS OF CIVIL
LITIGATION IN STATE COURTS
This reality raises the question of why perceptions
of civil litigation are so distorted. One possibility is
that some ndings from the Landscape study may
be at least partly attributed to ongoing eects of the
2008-2009 economic recession. For example, the
large proportion of debt collection and foreclosure
cases may have inated the proportion of contract
cases relative to other case types. However, the
majority of those cases were led after July 1, 2011,
well after the peak of civil lings from the recession.
Moreover, civil case ling statistics indicate that the
proportion of contract cases routinely uctuates over
time in response to economic conditions, and rarely
dips below 50 percent of civil caseloads. The relative
stability of caseload compositions over time tends to
counter the possibility that the Landscape ndings are
a temporary anomaly.
A more likely explanation is the focus on high-value and
complex litigation by the media (especially business
reports), much of which is led in federal rather than
state courts. Lower-value debt collections, landlord/
tenant cases, and automobile torts involving property
damage and soft-tissue injuries are rarely newswor-
thy. Another explanation is that perceptions are largely
driven by the experiences of lawyers, who are repeat
players in the civil justice system and who are much
more likely to be involved in high-value and complex
cases. Likewise, judges tend to focus on their experi-
ence in cases that demand a great deal of judicial
attention. A nal explanation for the distorted percep-
tion of civil caseloads is the institutional complexity
inherent in the variety of organizational structures
89 INSTITUTE FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF THE AMERICAN LEGAL SYSTEM, INTERIM REPORT ON T HE JOINT PROJECT OF THE
AMERICAN COLLEGE O F TRIAL L AWYERS TASK FORCE ON DISC OVERY AND CIVIL JUSTICE AND IA ALS A-2-3.
90 After the Utah Supreme Cour t implemented mandator y restrictions on the scope of discovery based on the amount in controversy in
Novembe r 2011, attorneys appear to have inated the purported amount-in-controversy to secure assignment to higher dis covery tiers. U TAH
RULE 26 REPORT, supra note 32, at 10-12. The NH PAD Pilot Rule s required attorneys to meet and confer within 20 days of the ling of the
Answer to establish deadlines for va rious discover y events, a lternative dispute resolution (ADR) proce edings, dispos itive moti ons, and a trial
date, and submit a wri tten stipulation to the cour t to be used as the case structuring order. Although compliance with the PAD Pilot Rules was
quite high, it did not have the intended eect of reduci ng disposition time. Because the rules did not impose restrictions on the timeframe for
completing discovery a nd pretrial proce dures, attorneys simply stipulate d to the timef rames to which they were already accustomed. NE W
HAMPSHIRE PAD RULES REPORT, supra note 31, at 7-9.
91 Several states and local trial cour ts have developed opt-in programs des igned to increase civil jury trial rates by oering expedited pretrial
proces sing, but participation rates have varied considerably. See SHORT, SUMMA RY & EXPEDITED, supra note 14.

37
of this tradition oer several justications. First is a
philosophical justication that although the civil justice
system is a public forum, the cases themselves remain
private disputes that should be wholly controlled by
the parties. Proponents of party-driven pacing argue
that the parties have more complete knowledge about
the case and the attractiveness of any proposed
resolution and are therefore are in a better position
to determine the pace at which the case should
proceed and the extent to which additional invest-
ments in litigation are worthwhile. Second, until fairly
recently, most litigants were represented by attorneys
who were repeat-players in the civil justice system.
As such, courts have generally been more attentive
to bar demands for control over case management
than litigant demands for speedy, just, and inexpen-
sive resolution of disputes.
Finally, courts historically have not had sucient
resources to eectively manage civil caseloads. The
sheer volume of civil cases led in state courts greatly
overwhelms the ability of judges to provide individ-
ual attention and oversight to every case. Instead,
judges focus most of their attention on the “squeaky
wheels,” (cases involving overly aggressive litigants
clamoring for the court’s attention and using extensive
motions practice to disagree on every conceivable
issue). Judges have few incentives to pay attention
to those cases that are just quietly “pending” on the
civil docket. With rare exceptions, previous recom-
mendations concerning caseow management have
not been broadly adopted or institutionalized in state
courts. Nor have courts developed case management
automation to support eective caseow management.
While most automation systems can track case lings
and calendar events, they lack the ability to monitor
compliance with deadlines or other court orders.92
Case progress, therefore, depends on the litigants
to inform the court that the case is in need of some
judicial action (e.g., to resolve a discovery dispute, rule
on a summary judgment motion, or schedule the case
for trial). Furthermore, non-judicial sta serve primarily
in clerical roles and rarely have either the training or
the authority to undertake routine case management
tasks on behalf of the judge. As a result, state courts
struggle to comply with the Standards.
THE FUTURE OF THE CIVIL JUSTICE SYSTEM
IN STATE COURTS?
Substantial evidence supports allegations that civil jury
and bench trials have declined precipitously over the
past several decades.93 The most frequent explana-
tion for this trend is that the cost and time involved
in getting to trial make alternative methods of dispute
resolution more attractive.94 A substantial commer-
cial industry providing ADR services (e.g., mediation,
arbitration, private judging) not only actively competes
with state and federal courts for business, it even
relies largely on experienced trial lawyers and judges
to provide those services. Not only are these methods
more likely to be pursued in existing disputes, many
routine consumer and commercial transactions (e.g.,
utility contracts, nancial services agreements, health-
care and insurance contracts, commercial mergers,
and employment contracts) now specify that future
disputes must be resolved by mediation or binding
arbitration.95 The rise of the Internet economy has also
92 The COSCA-NACM-NCSC Joint Techn ology Committee began develop ing Next-Gen tech nology standards for cou rt automation in e arly
2015. JOINT TECHNOLOGY COMMIT TEE, BUSINESS CASE FOR NEXT-GEN CMS STANDARDS DE VELOPMENT (June 10, 2014), http://www.
ncsc.org/~/media/Files/PDF/About%20Us/Committees/JTC/BusinessCaseforNextGenCMS%20StandardsDevelopmentDRAFT7214.ashx. More
eective judicial tools are also envisione d as par t of the Next-Gen standards. JTC Resourc e Bulletin: Making the Case for Judicial Tools (Dec. 5,
2014), http://www.ncsc.org/~/media/Files/PDF/About%20Us/Committees/JTC/JTC%20Resource%20Bulletins/Judicial%20Tools%201%200%20
FINAL.ashx.
93 The Vanishi ng Trial, supra note 20.
94 Thoma s J. Stipanowich, ADR and the “Vanishing Trial ”: The Growt h and Impac t of Alternative Dis pute Reso lution, 1 EMPIRICAL LEG. ST. 843
(2004); Stephen C. Yeazell, Getting Wh at We Asked For, Getting What We Pa id For, and Not Liking What We Got: The Vanishi ng Civil Trial, 1 J.
EMPIRICAL LEG. ST. 943 (2004).
95 CONSUMER FINANCIAL PROTECTION BUREAU, ARBITRATION STUDY: REPORT TO CONGRESS, PURSUANT TO DODD-FRANK WALL
STREET AND CONSUMER PROTECTION ACT §1028(a), Section II, 6-26 (March 2015).

38
spurred the development of online dispute resolution
forums for major Internet-based companies such as
E-bay, PayPal, and Amazon.96 A signicant conse-
quence of these trends is the growing lack of jury trial
experience within the bar and increasingly the state
court trial bench. This may further feed the decline in
civil jury trials as lawyers and judges discourage their
use due to unfamiliarity with trial practices.97 In addition
to declining trial rates, there is growing concern that
many civil litigants are not ling claims in state courts
at all.98 Preemptive clauses for binding arbitration in
consumer and commercial contracts divert claims
away from state courts, but other factors including
federal preemption of certain types of cases,99 inter-
national treaties,100 and legislative requirements that
litigants exhaust administrative remedies in state or
federal agencies before seeking court review101 have
also proliferated in recent years.
Although not related to trends in civil caseloads and
disposition rates, state court budgets declined precip-
itously during the economic recessions in 2002-2003
and again in 2008–2009. Although most state courts
experienced some recovery after the 2003 recession,
there is currently no expectation among state court
policymakers that state court budgets will return
to pre-2008 recession levels. Moreover, state and
federal constitutional and statutory provisions place
higher priority on criminal and domestic caseloads
in state courts, further undermining timely and eec-
tive management of civil caseloads. For the past
two decades, state courts leaders have resigned
themselves to doing more with less, all the while
watching civil litigants move with their feet to
other forums to resolve disputes or forego civil
justice entirely.
These trends have severe implications for the future of
the civil justice system and for public trust and con-
dence in state courts. The cost and delays of civil
litigation greatly outpace the monetary value of most
cases led in state courts, eectively denying access
to justice for most litigants and undermining the legit-
imacy of the courts as a fair and eective forum to
resolve disputes. Reductions in the proportion of civil
cases resolved through formal adjudication threaten to
erode a publicly accessible body of law governing civil
cases. Fewer common law precedents will leave future
litigants without clear standards for negotiating civil
transactions or conforming their conduct in a respon-
sible manner. The privatization of civil litigation likewise
undermines the ability of the legislative and execu-
tive branches of government to respond eectively
to developing societal circumstances that become
apparent through claims led in state courts. Because
the civil justice system directly touches everyone in
contemporary American society — through housing,
food, education, employment, household services
and products, personal nance, and commercial
transactions — ineective civil case management by
state courts has an outsized eect on public trust and
condence compared to the criminal justice system. If
state court policymakers are to preserve the traditional
role of state courts as the primary forum for dispute
resolution, civil justice reform can no longer be delayed
or even implemented incrementally through changes in
rules of civil procedure. Instead, it will require dramatic
changes in court operations to provide considerably
greater court oversight of caseow management to
control costs, reduce delays, and improve litigants’
experiences with the civil justice system.
96 Online dispute resolution services have b ecome so widely available that an ac ademic journa l — The Inter nationa l Journa l of Onlin e
Dispute Resolution — has been launched to provide practitioners with information about current initiatives and developments. See http://
www.international-odr.com/. Pablo Cortés, D evelop ing Onli ne Dispu te Resolution for C onsume rs in the EU: A Pro posal for the Regu lation of
Accredited Providers, 19 INT’L J. L. & INFORMATION TECH. 1 (2011).
97 Paula Hannaford-Agor et al., Trial Trends and Implications for the Civil Justice System, 11 CASELOAD HIGHLIGHTS 6 (June 2005).
98 The NCSC Cour t Statistics Proj ect reports that civil lings have declined by 13.5% since the peak in ling s in 2009. A lthough population
adjusted lings var y periodicall y in respons e to economic conditions, there is no apparent decrease overall since 1987, the year that the NCSC
began reporting these statistics.
99 CLASS ACTION FAIRNESS ACT OF 2005, 28 USC §§ 1332(d), 1453, 1711-1715; David G. Owen, Fed eral Pre emption of Product L iabili ty
Claims, 55 S.C. L. RE V. 411 (2003).
100 Joachim Pohl, Dispute S ettle ment Provi sions in International Invest ment Agre ements: A Large Sam ple Sur vey, OECD WORKING PAPERS ON
INTERNATIONAL INVESTMENT (2012 /02).
101 JACOB A. STEIN, ADMINISTRATIVE LAW §§ 49.01-03 (Exhaustion of Administrative Remedies) (2013).