CHAPTER 2 - 2-2 Discovery's Purpose

• Jurisdiction: United States

2-2 Discovery's Purpose

Discovery's purpose is to allow the parties to obtain full knowledge of the issues and facts before trial, with the goal being "'to seek the truth so that disputes are decided by what the facts reveal, not by what facts are concealed.'"² The Texas Supreme Court has emphasized that discovery is "the linchpin of the search for truth, as it makes a trial less of a game of blind man's bluff and more a fair contest with the issues and facts disclosed to the fullest practicable extent."³ By enabling parties to obtain (and exchange) information and material regarding their claims and defenses before trial, the Texas discovery rules, in theory, eliminate "trial by ambush," cause actions to be resolved on their merits, and promote settlement by giving parties the information and material needed to fully and accurately evaluate their positions' merits.⁴

Unfortunately, innovations in computer word processing and photocopying that allow even litigants of modest means to bury their opponents in voluminous "boilerplate" discovery requests or objections—compounded by a weakening in professional ethics that in earlier times would have made discovery misuse or abuse unthinkable, and technological advancements in the 1990s (e.g., email and other computer use) that greatly increased the volume of documents and other things subject to discovery—made it clear to the Texas Supreme Court that unrestricted discovery could be, and was being, used to needlessly and improperly drive up litigation costs to extort settlements and hinder the timely disposition of actions.⁵ Accordingly, in an effort to eliminate discovery's excesses while retaining its benefits, the Texas discovery rules were amended extensively in 1999 and introduced, for the first time, limits on the amount of, and time for, discovery by means of discovery-control plans and discovery levels, which are discussed in the following Chapters.⁶ Discovery abuses continued under the 1999 rules.

Since 1999, the Texas Supreme Court has amended the discovery rules twice in an effort "to promote the prompt, efficient, and cost-effective resolution of civil actions[.]"⁷ In 2013, the court introduced an expedited-actions process (in Texas Rule 169) and made it subject to Level 1 discovery.⁸ Then, effective January 1, 2021, the court significantly expanded the types of cases subject to the expedited-actions process and made additional amendments to the Texas discovery rules "to promote the prompt, efficient, and cost-effective resolution of civil actions[.]"⁹

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Notes:

^[2] In re Colonial Pipeline Co., 968 S.W.2d 938, 941 (Tex. 1998)...