¹ The 1870 constitution was in effect until 1970, but in 1962 the judicial article, art. 6, was amended. The amendment, which went into effect on January 1, 1964, completely restructured the multilevel system of trial courts into a single, unified trial court system (see Underwood, 1971).

² For a brief overview of the justice of the peace courts see Daniels (1985: 391).

³ All source materials used are kept by the circuit clerks in the respective county courthouses in Greenville (Bond), Petersburg (Menard), Peoria (Peoria), and Springfield (Sangamon).

⁴ Because my interest here is in comparing what different courts do, rather than in what litigants do and the relationship of what litigants do to socioeconomic factors, I am using proportions. Later in the discussion, when I turn to the effects of environmental factors, I will use rates of litigation per 1,000 population.

⁵ With regard to contract matters the important difference was the dollar ceiling on county court jurisdiction. The circuit court's exclusive chancery jurisdiction did give it sole responsibility for all equitable remedies in these matters (e.g., specific performance), but few appeared on the circuit dockets.

⁶ There were 334 manufacturing units in Peoria in 1870, 402 in 1880, 622 in 1890, and 1,025 in 1900; but the number dropped to 295 by 1910. A similar pattern is evident for the percentage of population employed in manufacturing—sharp increase until 1890, followed by a long, steady decline until 1920. Perhaps most indicative of this rapid takeoff, peak, and then subsequent decrease in industrial development is the pattern followed by the value added by manufacturing (an indicator of production and industrial prosperity which, as all dollar figures used in this article, is expressed in 1967 dollars). It skyrocketed between 1880 and 1890, from just under $20 million to almost $160 million. After 1890, value added by manufacturing began a long, steady decline to a level of $29.5 million in 1920.

⁷ Although the importance of agriculture was waning in Peoria (the number of farms per 1,000 population declined from its high of 53 in 1880 to 24 in 1915), events in this sector still had some influence on contract matters. The level of agricultural prosperity, as indicated by average farm value (in 1967 dollars), did have some influence against the stronger affects of rapid industrialization. The years 1870–80 were not especially prosperous, as farm value stayed relatively stable (and the rate for contract matters declined). The years 1880–90 were prosperous as farm value increased (and the rate from contract increased). From 1890 to 1900, farm value leveled off again, but the rate for contract matters dropped dramatically during this decade, which was also a decade with a significant decline in industrial prosperity. A sharp increase in farm value between 1900 and 1910 coincided with a leveling off in the rate for contract matters.

⁸ Sangamon remained more agricultural than Peoria with a consistently higher number of farms/1,000 population, and its farms were consistently more valuable on average. As in Peoria, however, fluctuations in agricultural prosperity did have an affect on the rate for contract matters in the circuit court. When times were more prosperous for this sector of the local economy, the rate for contract matters moved upward, and when times were less prosperous the rate moved downward. For instance, average farm value declined slightly in the 1870s and the rate for contract matters declined. From 1880 to 1890, farm value increased and the rate for contract matters leveled off, increasingly only slightly. And during the 1890s agricultural prosperity slowed as the increase in farm value ended and the rate for contract matters also declined.

⁹ The number in Sangamon peaked at 448 units in 1890, and declined thereafter. In Peoria, there were 622 units in 1890 and the number of units peaked at 1,025 in 1900. More telling is the difference between the counties in value added by manufacturing. In Sangamon, it increased only slightly and gradually after 1870, never exceeding $15 million. In contrast, as noted earlier, value added peaked at almost $160 million in Peoria (see note 6).

¹⁰ In 1870, 84,500 tons of coal were mined in Sangamon; by 1890, it had reached 894,705 tons. After 1890, tonnage rapidly increased until 1920 when it reached 6.8 million tons. During the same period, Peoria's tonnage never exceeded 1.25 million tons.

¹¹ While coal productivity consistently increased until 1920, the pattern for rates in contract matters in Fig. 1 is one of decrease from 1890 to 1905, increase to 1915, and decrease again. This pattern appears to owe more to patterns in the manufacturing sector than to patterns in the coal mining sector.

¹² Although it had' more farms/1,000 population than Menard, Bond's farms were smaller and the discrepancy increased with time. Its farms were also more likely to have been operated by their owner than by tenants, a discrepancy that also increased with time. Taken together, these characteristics suggest a relatively less intensive and less profitable agricultural sector in Bond than in Menard (see Tingley, 1980: 43). This is further evidenced by the differences in farm value. Between 1870 and 1910, farm value peaked at $16,876 in Bond in 1910 (1967 dollars). Average farm value in Menard peaked in 1910 at $63,734. As a consequence of this less prosperous agricultural sector, Bond had more manufacturing units than Menard and a greater percentage of its population employed in manufacturing.

¹³ The coal mining industry in Menard developed quickly after 1880. There was apparently little or no coal mined in 1870. By 1882, tonnage reached 96,000 and by 1890 it jumped to 255,000. Tonnage reached 397,000 in 1900, and peaked at 448,000 in 1905. In contrast, coal production in Bond peaked at 163,000 tons in 1900. After 1905, Menard's coal production steadily declined.

¹⁴ The increasing rate of tenancy is a further indication of prosperity within an agricultural sector strong enough to support tenant farming for a profit on larger tracts of land (see Tingley, 1980: 43).

¹⁵ In the two urban counties, the respective long-term declines in the rates for property litigation roughly mirrored the steady, long-term decline in farms/1,000 population in these counties and the increases in value added by manufacturing after 1920. The general decline in property matters was less marked in Sangamon until 1940 compared to Peoria. Sangamon, however, remained more agricultural than Peoria and more agriculturally prosperous. The sharp drop in the rate for property matters in Sangamon circuit court after 1940 came at the same time as the sharpest increase in value added by manufacturing.