单选题 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, or parties, have to wait sometimes many years before having their day in court. Many suggestions have been made concerning methods of ameliorating (改善) the situation, but as in most branches of government, changes come slowly.
One suggestion that has been made in order to maximize the efficiency 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 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 when 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 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 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 (辩护)—the litigants need to make only a one-sentence statement of their claim. By going to this type of court, the plaintiff (原告) waives (放弃) any right to a jury trial and the right to appeal the decision.

单选题 The pretrial conference, in theory, is supposed to do all of the following except ______.

单选题 What is the main topic of the passage?

A、 All states should follow California"s example in using small-claims courts in order to free judges for other work
B、 The legislature needs to formulate fewer laws so that the judiciary can catch up on its older cases
C、 Nobody seems to care enough to attempt to find methods for making the judicial system more efficient
D、 While there are many problems with the court system, there are viable suggestions for improvement

单选题 The word "litigants" means most nearly ______.

【正确答案】 C

【答案解析】[解析] 语义题。原文多处提到litigants一词。根据此词前后的内容attorneys，make only a one-sentence statement判定文中的litigants意为“诉讼”。选项中，jury members“陪审团成员”；commentators“评论员”；parties in a lawsuit“诉讼部分”；taxpayers“纳税人”。故答案为C。

单选题 Which of the following is true about small-claims courts?

单选题 What can we assume from the passage?

【正确答案】 B

【答案解析】[解析] 细节推断题。原文讨论的是美国司法体系的不足以及改善的建议和所要解决的问题。根据原文首段第二句中的Costs与选项B重现，原句中的have to wait sometimes many years与选项B中的time required对应，可以推测相互存在的问题应该是费用和时间。故答案为B。