State Ratings

Respondents were asked to give states a grade ("A", "B", "C", "D" or "F") in each of the following areas: having and enforcing meaningful venue requirements, overall treatment of tort and contract litigation, treatment of class action suits and mass consolidation suits, punitive damages, timeliness of summary judgment or dismissal, discovery, scientific and technical evidence, non-economic damages, judges' impartiality and competence, and juries' predictability and fairness. These grades were combined to create an overall ranking of state liability systems.

Further, as the following table highlights, in the past five years there has been a significant increase in the overall average scores.

Year Average Overall Score among 50 States
2007 61.7
2006 59.5
2005 57.5
2004 57.8
2003 55.8

While there continues to be a wide disparity between the states in terms of those that are perceived to be the best and the worst, nonetheless the overall trend is improving.

According to the general counsel and senior litigators, the states doing the best and worst job of "creating a fair and reasonable litigation environment" are [See map below]

Top 5 Bottom 5
Delaware (#1) West Virginia (#50)
Minnesota (#2) Mississippi (#49)
Nebraska (#3) Louisiana (#48)
Iowa (#4) Alabama (#47)
Maine (#5) Illinois (#46)

Map of Overall Ranking of State Liability Systems

Overall Ranking of State Liability Systems

  2007
STATE RANK SCORE N
Delaware 1 75.6 109
Minnesota 2 70.6 86
Nebraska 3 70 63
Iowa 4 68.9 95
Maine 5 68.9 48
New Hampshire 6 68.2 59
Tennessee 7 68.2 101
Indiana 8 68.2 88
Utah 9 67.7 87
Wisconsin 10 67.5 102
South Dakota 11 67 51
Virginia 12 66.9 101
Kansas 13 66.7 96
Connecticut 14 66.3 62
Arizona 15 66.3 94
North Carolina 16 65.9 87
Oregon 17 65.7 67
Massachusetts 18 65.7 123
New York 19 65.6 197
North Dakota 20 65.4 48
Colorado 21 65.1 90
Wyoming 22 64.7 49
Michigan 23 64.2 110
Ohio 24 63.9 123
Washington 25 63.7 116
New Jersey 26 63.4 137
Vermont 27 62.5 46
Nevada 28 62 70
Maryland 29 61.7 74
Idaho 30 61.3 52
Georgia 31 61.2 106
Pennsylvania 32 60.8 146
Kentucky 33 60.8 90
Missouri 34 60 99
Rhode Island 35 58.5 68
Florida 36 58.2 186
South Carolina 37 58.1 81
Oklahoma 38 57.7 82
New Mexico 39 57.5 59
Montana 40 57.2 58
Arkansas 41 56.5 76
Hawaii 42 56.3 54
Alaska 43 56 48
Texas 44 54.3 210
California 45 53.5 286
Illinois 46 50.8 180
Alabama 47 50.7 107
Louisiana 48 47.3 142
Mississippi 49 46.1 156
West Virginia 50 38 134