Somehow this (strangely written) press release, about the “record numbers” of “self-represented” litigants in U.S. courts, got lost in my backlog. These statistics are not really news, but we ought to note that the release comes from a debt-counseling/”educational” firm called “Credit Card Rest in Peace.” Is it disturbing that the nonlawyer private sector is starting to jump at these millions of Americans who are getting no help from the legal profession? To the courts and state governments it is, a little, as they have begun setting up support programs for these “self-represented.” But, as Rollie Thompson of Dalhousie University would point out, that’s a “dangerous term. The vast majority of lawyer-less parties are ‘unrepresented,’ as they have no choice.”