Domestic relations cases, not litigiousness, drive most growth in civil filings.
Evidence
The greatest single source of the increase in civil cases over time has been anunereasein divorce and post-divorce proceedings (domestic relations cases). One author wryly notes: “Few of us, I suspect, know many people who filed for divorce because they were enamored of litigation or beguiled by lawyers.” … In addition, although civil filings rose during the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries, they did not increase uniformly in all regions of the country and in all areas of the law, as might be expected if Americans had grown more litigious (see Table 7.3). — G. Alan Tarr, Judicial Process and Judicial…, 2325
Categorization
- SEED: Angle: ‘The litigation explosion is a divorce story’ — a piece showing that caseload panic gets misattributed to tort lawyers when family law explains the curve.
- XREF: connects to: Americans rarely convert their disputes into lawsuits despite high civil filing rates — G. Alan Tarr, Judicial Process and Judicial…, 1133; Legal profession growth tracked commercial expansion, not litigation demand alone — Lawrence M. Friedman and Grant M. Hayden, American Law: An Introduction, 1215; Judges resolve far more civil cases through motions than trials do — G. Alan Tarr, Judicial Process and Judicial…, 1089 (+1 more)
Broader Connections
- Legal profession growth tracked commercial expansion, not litigation demand alone
#qualifies(0.95) — Lawrence M. Friedman and Grant M. Hayden, American Law, 1215 - Judges resolve far more civil cases through motions than trials do
#expands(0.90) — G. Alan Tarr, Judicial Process and Judicial…, 1089 - Pretrial proceedings, not trials, determine most civil case outcomes
#expands(0.90) — G. Alan Tarr, Judicial Process and Judicial…, 2200