Access to Justice

• Citation: Vol. 37
• Year: 2025

ACCESS TO JUSTICE

No. Vol. 37 Issue 2 Pg. 23

South Carolina Lawyer

September, 2025

HANNAH HONEYCUTT, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, SC ACCESS TO JUSTICE COMMISSION AND OLIVIA S. JONES, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, SC BAR FOUNDATION

I Will Assist

Understanding Civil Legal Needs & Bridging the Justice Gap In S.C.

In 2021. the S.C. Access to Justice Commission, the S.C. Bai: and the NMRS Center on Professionalism at USC School of Law commissioned South Carolinas first-ever Statewide. Civil Legal Needs Assessment. The resulting report is both comprehensive and granular: giving us a deeper understanding of the legal needs of low- and moderate-income South Carolinians and how they access (or can't access) our system of justice. Each installment of this column will focus on a key takeaway from the assessment's Executive Summary, in hopes that you will come away better informed about legal needs in South Carolina and what you can do to help.

Key Finding #10: The caseload of South Carolina civil courts is heavy, and concentrated in counties with lower incomes, more unemployment, and higher proportions of Black residents.

In our last column we explored how geography affects access to lawyers— both private practitioners and legal aid attorneys. This would still be a significant issue if filing rates and court dockets looked the same across South Carolina, but variations in court case loads further compound the problem.

While counties with larger populations generally have higher case rates, counties with the highest caseloads also tend to rank lower in median household income, have higher unemployment rates, and are home to larger Black populations—all groups that face persistent access-to-justice gaps. Some of the highest civil court case rates are in rural parts of the state, despite the fact that there are fewer lawyers in these areas to meet the demand for legal services and poverty levels are higher. Compare the ten counties with the highest per capita civil case rates—Dillon, Florence, Marion, Sumter, Cherokee. Orangeburg, Colleton, Richland, Greenwood, and Union—with the map we included in the last issue. Only Richland and Florence are among the top ten counties with the highest number of lawyers, and only Richland, Florence, and Orangeburg are home to a legal aid office. This leaves many defendants who are facing civil legal problems such as claim and delivery, debt collection, eviction, and foreclosure without access to a lawyer. Among all civil matters in Circuit Court, 97.6% of plaintiffs are represented, but only 28.3% of defendants have lawyers. In eviction and claim and delivery cases. 99% of defendants are unrepresented.

Counties where case rates are highest for housing and family law problems (areas the Needs Assessment identified as greatest need) also tend to be poorer counties with larger Black populations. Eviction especially stands out, both for the size of the caseload and because eviction rates don't correspond closely to socioeconomic characteristics of a county. In every county in the state, cases related to eviction are by far the largest category of any the researchers measured. Statewide, the average annual eviction caseload per 1,000 of population is 20.8, compared to 4.4 for divorce and separation, 3.4 for debt collection, and 2.8 for child support cases. For eviction, however, case rates are highest in counties with the highest percentage of renter households (Dillon, Richland, and Charleston) and the lowest housing vacancy rates (Spartanburg, Greenwood).

These patterns reveal another important facet of the justice gap in South Carolina: court caseloads are heaviest in our most vulnerable communities, in areas where lawyers are few and far between.

Caseloads in South Carolina are heavy and concentrated in our most vulnerable areas, but you can help:

Educate: Tell someone about the issues. Send them a copy of the SCATJ Commission's 2023 Legal Needs Assessment or 2021 Justice Gap Report. Talk to your local leaders about the need for civil legal aid.

Volunteer: Take the time to volunteer: contract with legal aid providers around the state: take a case for a low rate or even pro bono.

Donate: Make a donation to one of our legal aid provider partners or to the S.C. Bar Foundation, which makes grants to fund civil legal aid in South Carolina.

Next time: By qualitative and quantitative measures, legal services resources are well spent.

Don't want to wait? Read the Assessment and explore the data at scaccesstojustice.org legal-needs.