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The prevalence of trials as a means for resolving civil cases has declined dramatically in recent years in both federal and state courts.'1 This is the starding conclusion of groundbreaking work spearheaded by University of Wisconsin Law School Professor Marc Galanter who has identified and described" the vanishing trial" phenomenon. 2

Here are some thought-provoking statistics concerning the decline in civil trials (current as of 2002 data):• In federal court, case dispositions increased from about 50,000 in 1962 to more than 250,000 in 2002; yet after peaking at over 12,000 trials in 1985, the number of trials declined to about 4,500 in 2002, which is less than the 5,800 civil cases that were tried in 1962. Thus, the proportion of federal civil cases resolved by trial declined from 11.5 percent in 1962 to 1.8 percent in 2002. Of the cases that went to trial in 1962 about half (47.7 percent) were jury trials; of the cases that …