Pleading Poverty in Federal Court
Pleading Poverty in Federal Court
复制标题
在联邦法院辩护贫困
DOI：
10.2139/ssrn.3102522
复制
发表时间：
2018
期刊：
影响因子：
6.4
通讯作者：
Andrew Hammond
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Andrew Hammond
一个穷人要向联邦法院提出什么请求？法院如何决定一个贫穷的诉讼当事人是否足够贫穷？本文回答了这些问题的第一个全面的研究，如何地方法院确定当一个诉讼当事人可以进行形式专利是在民事诉讼。这篇文章表明，地方法院缺乏确定诉讼当事人贫困的标准，往往要求诉讼当事人回答一系列问题，但收效甚微。结果，联邦实践中的差异比比皆是--在地区法院之间和地区法院内部--并产生了一个武断、低效和侵入性的辩护系统。本文有四个贡献。首先，它对94个联邦地区法院目前使用的所有贫困诉状进行了编码。其次，文章表明，这些申诉程序的缺陷既不是不可避免的，也不是贫困确定的特征。通过将联邦做法与其他联邦经济状况调查和州法院做法进行比较，该条表明，一种更精简但尊重权利的做法是可能的。第三，该条款提出了一个连贯的形式诉讼标准--使联邦实践与联邦法律保持一致，促进合理的司法管理，保护诉讼当事人的尊严。这种解决办法证明，法官不必在扩大诉诸司法的机会和保留法院资源之间作出选择。在这种情况下，也许还有其他情况下，法官可以同时履行联邦制度的两项义务。第四，从自下而上的角度研究程序问题。考虑到美国社会持续存在的不平等程度，如果不了解当今穷人如何诉讼，任何民事诉讼程序都是不完整的。
What must a poor person plead to gain access to the federal courts? How do courts decide when a poor litigant is poor enough? This Article answers those questions with the first comprehensive study of how district courts determine when a litigant may proceed in forma pauperis in a civil lawsuit. This Article shows that district courts lack standards to determine a litigant’s poverty and often require litigants to answer an array of questions to little effect. As a result, discrepancies in federal practice abound — across and within district courts — and produce a pleading system that is arbitrary, inefficient, and invasive. This Article makes four contributions. First, it codes all the poverty pleadings currently used by the 94 federal district courts. Second, the Article shows that the flaws of these pleading procedures are neither inevitable nor characteristic of poverty determinations. By comparing federal practice to other federal means tests and state court practices, the Article demonstrates that a more streamlined, yet rights-respecting approach is possible. Third, the Article proposes a coherent in forma pauperis standard — one that would align federal practice with federal law, promote reasoned judicial administration, and protect the dignity of litigants. Such a solution proves that judges need not choose between extending access to justice and preserving court resources. In this instance and perhaps others, judges can serve both commitments of the federal system. Fourth, the Article illustrates how to study procedure from the bottom up. Given the persistent levels of inequality in American society, no account of civil procedure is complete without an understanding of how poor people litigate today.