From news editor Daniel Silliman: ​​I’m a little leery of news reports about lawsuits getting filed. It’s hard to tell right from the start if a suit is going to be important.

Maybe good lawyers can tell. But reporters don’t generally know. And my sense is that readers often overestimate the importance. Baby lawsuits don’t all grow up to go to the Supreme Court. In fact, most cases never actually get argued on their merits. They are decided on technical issues or result in some kind of settlement, the details of which are often not public. Some lawyers estimate that more than 90 percent of suits are settled out of court.

My suspicion is that sometimes suits are publicized at the time of filing because one side or the other is pushing for a settlement. That’s fine. The lawyers are doing their jobs. But if a story is communicating to readers that a big fight is going to happen in the courts, when really that’s not likely at all, then I don’t want to run that story.

At the same time—we don’t know. On Tuesday, we covered Bethany Christian Services’ lawsuit against the state of Michigan. Last week, we ran a piece by veteran reporter Bob Smietana on the National Religious Broadcasters suing the IRS. Even if they don’t result in landmark court decisions, the arguments the lawyers are making speak to issues that a lot of people are wrestling with.