The causes of the increase in litigation.

By 1600, the enormous increase in litigation which had taken place since the 1550s began to produce concern amongst observers, both inside and outside the legal profession, that there were too many lawsuits. In the space of a mere half-century England seemed to have become an extremely litigious country. Exactly how litigious early modern society was can be gauged only by making comparisons with other periods. We know already that for two hundred years before 1550 litigation in the central courts was much lower than it was to become by 1550. Going even further back into the past, during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, much legal work may have been done in local courts, but simple comparisons of the bulk of the plea rolls leave little doubt that central court business was nowhere near the level it was to reach under Elizabeth. For the period after 1640 and on into the eighteenth century, there is as yet no statistical evidence of sufficient quality on which to build a confident picture of trends in litigation. Cockburn's counts of cases heard by justices of assize remain high until the late 1660s and early 1670s, when a quite precipitous fall-off begins, which lasted well into the eighteenth century. But, since cases at assize were by definition cases nearing completion, such figures may not be a reliable guide to the number of causes commenced. Statements made by court officials to parliamentary inquiries give the quite contrary impression that litigation was still buoyant in the 1720s. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]