Implementation of the Civil Justice Reform Act in Pilot and Comparison Districts

The Civil Justice Reform Act of 1990 (CJRA) required each federal district court to develop a case management plan to reduce costs and delay. The legislation also created a pilot program to test six principles of case management, and required an independent evaluation to assess their effects. This report is one of four documents describing the evaluation, which was conducted by RAND’s Institute for Civil Justice. The report traces the stages in the CJRA implementation: the recommendations of the advisory groups, the plans adopted by the districts, and the plans actually implemented. The study found that all pilot districts complied with the statutory language of the act. But the amount of change varied widely, and in some districts, planned changes were not fully implemented. However, implementing the pilot plans may have heightened the consciousness of judges and lawyers and brought about some important implicit shifts in their approach to case management. See also MR-800-ICJ, MR-802-ICJ, and MR-803-ICJ.