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Continuity and Change in Patterns of Case Handling: A Case Study of Two Rural Counties

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 July 2024

Stephen Daniels
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Abstract

This article examines the patterns and changes in the way trial courts have handled both civil and criminal matters. It does so by looking for similarities between the civil and criminal dockets in all levels of trial courts in two rural counties in Illinois for a 90-year period (1870-1960). The data from these sites suggest that there may be an overall pattern in the way matters are handled, one that has fluctuations and changes within it but seems to have persisted over time. About 90 percent of the matters filed in the two counties did not involve a contested hearing or judgment. The pattern of handling matters was characterized, instead, by shifts between the routine processing of uncontested matters and matters that dropped out of the courts short of judgment. Contested matters were always the exception and not the rule. Contrary to some claims found in the literature, the shifts within the pattern seem to reflect changes in the mix of court business rather than some fundamental change driven by environmental factors and marking an overall demise of trials.

Type
Research Article
Information
Law & Society Review , Volume 19 , Issue 3 , 1985 , pp. 381 - 420
Copyright
Copyright © 1985 by The Law and Society Association

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Footnotes

*

Research supported in part by the National Science Foundation, Law and Social Sciences Program, Grant Number SES-8010988. The author wishes to acknowledge the valuable suggestions and help of Robert Hayden, Richard Lempert, and Joanne Martin.

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