Fortifying Families Through Digital Access to Justice

The American civil justice system is in crisis. In three-quarters of the 20 million civil cases filed in state courts each year, at least one side lacks a lawyer. Many of these involve significant and even life-altering matters–debt collection actions, evictions, and family law matters. Without a lawyer, many individuals and families cannot protect their rights, and millions of cases end in “default judgment”–an automatic loss when a party fails to take any action.

The fundamental unfairness and social cost of this “justice gap” are acutely evident in eviction cases. Across the U.S., landlords file 3.5 million evictions each year. In California, evictions displace 500,000 tenants annually, and in Los Angeles County alone, some 47,000 eviction cases were filed in 2023. In a large number of these cases, tenants fail to respond despite viable defenses that could delay or prevent displacement, with rippling consequences for housing and family stability, employment, and health that fall most heavily on vulnerable populations.

Many factors contribute to the access-to-justice crisis, among them anemic legal aid funding, rising economic insecurity, and a frayed social safety net. But there is also mounting evidence that a core part of the problem is courts themselves. Court procedures were built by lawyers for lawyers, with inscrutable forms, byzantine filing systems, and needlessly complex procedures.