Chapter Seven
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and by that I mean the broad sense of the term “process” as a non-
specialist would understand it.
So the term “process”, when used in “service of process”, is a
metonymy. A part of the case is referred to by naming the whole. This
combined with “service” creates a conceptual metaphor wherein the
physical act of serving the papers is seen as “serving” (or handing) the
case (which is an abstract entity) over to the opposing party.
The jargon terminology used for this action leads to confusion, partly
because litigants not versed in law do not understand the procedure
involved and the need for a third person to perform the “service”. The
forms and the variations in methodology possible are the result of years of
experience in the courts with regard to the problem of definitively proving
that a party actually received the papers. These are experiences that the
litigants have not had, especially if they have not gone to court before.
When the Pro Se Project did field tests on the new plain language
forms involved in service of process, the results were not good. Although
the new Return of Service form made sense to lawyers, it proved to be
quite problematic when tested on people representing the demographic of
those who go to court without lawyers. In fact, although the form is only
three pages long, it encountered more difficulty than the Parenting Plan
form, a 14-page form dealing with which spouse would provide what
financial support for various needs of the children, which would make
decisions as to their welfare, and when the children would reside with
which parent.
The Parenting Plan deals with aspects of the divorcing spouses’ lives
that they have already experienced or could understand readily, even if
they might not agree on how they are to be resolved. Indeed, the Parenting
Plan form ended up going through several iterations mostly because the
field test subjects and some lawyers suggested additional items that should
be included. The Parenting Plan form also needed revision in order to
tighten the layout, and some test takers felt that some questions were too
ambiguous (“Do we include medical expenses in question 4 and again in
question 7?”) and suggested alternative language.
Comments on the Return of Service form were entirely different in
nature, and not necessarily nice. In the end, we concluded that the problem
was a larger frame problem. What was necessary were instructions that
had to be added to the form, or alternatively, some courts and legal service
agencies have provided videos that show the process with real people as
actors. We could not lengthen the form enough to do the job for self-
represented litigants without making it so cumbersome that it would be