[ElProlactin]

I understand your intent, but:

> As far as consumer protection goes, the party with greater resources or sophistication (e.g., if you retain counsel against a pro se defendant or plaintiff) should have a higher standard of proof

No. Holding parties to different standards of evidence is a horrible idea and would do so much harm to a legal system that is already in many cases failing to function the way it was intended.

Determining who has "greater resources or sophistication" is itself a very thorny issue. For example, class action lawyers often look for Average Joes to become lead plaintiffs in highly-targeted lawsuits. These lawsuits are, in at least some if not many cases, designed less to defend the interests of individuals who have been harmed in some way (even theoretically) and more to extract settlements that result in hefty legal fees for themselves.

In these cases, it would be naive to treat the plaintiffs (who I would argue are proxies for the attorneys) as the parties with fewer resources or sophistication.

[underlipton]

>Holding parties to different standards of evidence is a horrible idea

We already do that. Plaintiffs can introduce whatever, and as long as it's plausible, defendants have to directly prove it's a falsehood or otherwise inadmissible (not just that it's plausibly so, perhaps circumstantially). Sewer service is a glaring example.

>In these cases, it would be naive to treat the plaintiffs (who I would argue are proxies for the attorneys) as the parties with fewer resources or sophistication.

You're assuming that I disagree. Pro bono/contingent/discounted hours billed would count towards "greater resources or sophistication", and while I'm sure lawyers would love to argue whether or not that's fair, I think you'd find that the Average Joe would say so. And I'd really like to live in a system which has his needs in mind more than that of Dick C. Eshahl, Esq.