At the First National
Conference of the Judiciary, held in Williamsburg, Virginia, in 1971,
Chief Justice Warren Burger called for the creation of a central
resource for the state courts—a "national center for state
courts." The
National Center for State Courts began operations that
same year at the headquarters of the Federal Judicial Center in
Washington, D.C., before moving to its permanent headquarters in
Williamsburg in 1978.
The National Center for
State Court's current mission, improving the administration through
leadership and service to the state courts, springs logically from its
original purpose—serving as an information clearinghouse so that
innovations in one court can benefit all courts. Initially, the
National Center concentrated on helping courts to
reduce backlogs and delay. This work included the publication of
the groundbreaking Justice Delayed: The Pace of Litigation in Urban
Trial Courts in 1978. The National Center also
gave judges and court administrators a vital national perspective on
court operations through its Court Statistics
Project (started in 1978);
the work of its Knowledge Information
Service, which handled more than
1,000 requests for court-related information during its first year of
operation (1979); and the holdings of its Library, the largest
collection of court administration-related materials in the world.
Since its founding in 1971,
the National Center for State Courts has played a key role in the
development of court administration worldwide. Important National
Center initiatives include
-
Developing the skills of
more than 1,000 court leaders through the Court Executive Development
Program of the Institute for Court Management
-
Improving how courts
treat jurors through the work of its Center for Jury Studies and the
promotion of innovations in jury system management
-
Promoting the use of
technology to improve court operations through National Court
Technology Conferences (starting in Chicago in 1984), original
research, and direct technical assistance
-
Developing in
partnership with courts standards for evaluating how well courts
serve the public, such as the Trial Court Performance Standards
(1987)
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Working with court
associations, such as the Conference of Chief Justices
and National
Association for Court Management, to improve public trust and
confidence in the courts by conducting and building upon the first
National Conference on Public Trust and Confidence in the Judiciary
(1999)
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Working with courts in
other countries to improve the rule of law worldwide
