Đọc đoạn văn sau và trả lời các câu hỏi:
In recent years, there has been an increasing awareness of the inadequacies
of the judicial system in the United States. Costs are staggering
both for the taxpayers and the litigants - and the litigants, of
parties, have to wait sometimes many yeas before having their day
5 in court. Many suggestions have been made concerning methods of ameliorating
the situation, but as in most branches of government, changes come
slowly.
One suggestion that has been made in order to maximize the efficiency
10 of the system is to allow districts that have an overabundance of
pending cases to borrow judges from other districts that do not have
such a backlog. Another suggestion is to use pretrial conferences,
in which the judge meets in his chambers with the litigants and their
attorneys in order to narrow the issues, limit the witnesses, and
15 provide for a more orderly trial, The theory behind pretrial conferences
is that judges will spend less time on each case and parties will
more readily settle before trial then they realize the adequacy of
their claims and their opponents' evidence. Unfortunately, at least
one study has shown that pretrial conferences actually use more judicial
20 time than they save, rarely result in pretrial settlements, and actually
result in higher damage settlements.
Many states have now established another method, small-claims courts,
in which cases over small sums of money can be disposed of with considerable
25 dispatch. Such proceedings cost the litigants almost nothing, In
California, for example, the parties must appear before the judge
without the assistance of counsel, The proceedings are quite informal
and there is no pleading - the litigants need to make only a one-sentence
statement of their claim. By going to this type of court, the plaintiff
30 waives any right to a jury trial and the right to appeal the decision.
In coming years, we can expect to see more and more innovations in
the continuing effort to remedy a situation which must be remedied
if the citizens who have valid claims are going to be able to have
35 their day in court.
1. The pretrial conference, in theory, is supposed to do all of the following except.
2. What is the main topic of the passage?
3. The word "litigants" in line 28 means most nearly
4. Which of the following is true about small-claims courts?
5. What can we assume from the passage?
Back Test with: Reading-Comprehension-Lesson 116 và bài Reading-Comprehension-Lesson 117
