User:Atcovi/AP Government/Judicial Branch

The US uses the Adversarial System (purpose of a trial: to find the person guilty). Other countries use the inquisitorial system (purpose of a trial: to find the truth).
 * Criminal law -- someone has harmed society itself and must be held accountable by the laws of that society.
 * Civil law -- an individual has suffered a financial harm in the form of a harm suffered personally caused by another.

Participants
amicus curiae - "someone who is not a party to a case who assists a court by offering information, expertise, or insight that has a bearing on the issues in the case"
 * Litigants (plantiff/defendant) -- they are actual parties to the dispute -- they cannot be third parties not directly involved.
 * Attorney -- large profession, 1 million attorney; not only for the rich.
 * Groups -- Amicus curiae briefs: a friend of the court brief that a third party submits.

"a per curiam decision is a ruling issued by an appellate court of multiple judges in which the decision rendered is made by the court acting collectively [with no explanation]."

Organizational Court

 * 91, at least one state
 * 2-28 judges per court; 678 in total
 * Original jurisdiction
 * Federal magistrate

Original jurisdiction is the court that first hears a case and determines law (how should the law be applied in this situation). and fact (who did what, when and how?). Question: Have the constiutional rights of the defendent been followed? Appeal courts do NOT determine guilty or not.

District Courts

 * Federal crimes
 * Civil suits under federal law
 * Civil suits between citizens of different states
 * Supervision of bankruptcy proceedings
 * Review of actions of some federal administrative agencies
 * Admirality (criminal) and maritime (civil) law cases
 * Supervision of the naturalization of aliens

Court of Appeals (whether the law was correctly applied)

 * Appellate jurisdiction - Civil and criminal cases, but they're hearing cases that have already been heard. They are determining whether the law has been applied ("the earlier trial of original jurisdiction, they made a mistake: applied the law incorrectly or treated a person unfairly"). Rare to be heard from the Supreme Court.


 * Review district court decisions
 * Review independent regulatory agency commission rulings
 * Most of the 53,000 cases come from district courts
 * Review and enforce IRC orders
 * 12 circuits, serving at least 2 states
 * 6-28 judges; 179 total
 * Errors of procedure and law
 * Set precedent

Supreme Court

 * Unique responsibilities: Resolving conflicts among states, maintaining national supremacy in law, ensuring uniformity in interpretation.
 * Composition: 8 associate justices; 1 chief justice
 * Controls its docket: 80 cases per year
 * Appeals must involve a substantial federal question

The Lower Courts

 * Senatorial courtesy (tradition) - this is dying due to the hyper-paritsan politics.

Supreme Court

 * Vacancies infrequent
 * Chief justice vacancy unique
 * Senatorial courtesy not relevant
 * Partisan balance in Senate key
 * Recent nominations

Background of the SC Judges

 * Mostly Catholic because of abortion
 * White, prominent judges and lawyers
 * 4 of the 9 justices must agree to hear a case

Our Supreme Court is quite powerful in the country.

Writ of Certiorari
An order to a lower court to produce a case for review. Following this, the justices' law clerks review dozens of cert requests that arrive to the Court and advise the justices on which ones raise significant important. The many cases are doubled down through the Rule of 4, in which 4 justices must agree to hear the case.
 * Obergefell vs Hodges

Frivolous issues

 * Fact-specific cases - add nothing to the legal doctrine
 * Cases involving insufficient evidence
 * Diversity cases

Certworthy
- Circuit Conflict: This is the premiere criterion used by the Court. The criterion is utilized when there is a conflict among the lower federal courts about an issue. The conflict must be intolerable and current. The reputation of the lower courts that are in conflict is a variable when applying this criterion. If the lower court is generally considered of low quality, then the Supreme Court will often not take the case, figuring that the system will "cleanse itself" eventually with other judges.

- Importance: There are a number of different ways that a case can be important enough to attract the Supreme Court's attention. Cases like Nixon vs. USA


 * Cases dealing with political and societal issues, such as Brown vs Board of Education. General rule: impact on people and effect on fed. gov't.

Terms

 * The US Supreme Court holds one term each year beginning on the first Monday in October.
 * Before the start of the term in October, the justices read and research (with the help of their clerks) all necessary briefs.
 * Their terms consist of Sittings and Conferences.

Sittings

 * During this time, the Court hears oral arguments, usually lasting about an hour.
 * Oral arguments is the opportunity for the opposing lawyers to represent their legal arguments. The justices question the lawyers about their legal arguments.

Conference

 * Each week the justices meet in a conference or closed session to discuss the cases heard that week.
 * The chief justice leads these discussions and can, by the way he frames the questions at issue, try to shape the results of the discussion.
 * Following the conference discussion and a preliminary vote by the justices, the chief justice, if he is in the majority, assigns the drafting of the Court's decision to himself or to one of his colleagues.
 * If the chief justice is not with the majority, the assignment is made by the senior justice in the majority.

Drafting

 * The Supreme Court's decision is called an opinion.
 * The justice assigned to write the Court's opinion produces a draft that is circulated to the other justices for their comments, suggestions and advice.
 * Several drafts may be written and circulated before enough justices are willing to adopt the opinion as the final statement of the Court in the case at hand.
 * A decision of the Court may receive various levels and kinds of support/opposition from the nine justices.

Unanimous Decision

 * Each justice assigned to draft an opinion for the Court hopes to produce a unanimous opinion (Each justice will approve and sign).

Concurring Opinion

 * From time to time, a justice might write a separate opinion to produce reasoning behind the ruling.

Divided Decisions

 * Majority opinion: majority of the justices.
 * Dissenting Opinion: these justices with the minority view will decide who will write up their views. Example of this is John Harlan in the Plessy vs. Ferguson, who spoke up against the separate but equal doctrine.

Outcomes

 * If the SC agrees with the ruling made by the lower court, it is said to affirm the lower court.
 * If the justice disagree in whole/in party with the result at that level, they are reversing the lower court. This is usually accompanied with what the result should have been.
 * Finally, the SC may remand the case back to the lower court for certain issues.

Basis of Decisions

 * Vast majority of cases decided on the principle of stare decisis (cases are judged on basis of precedent).

Why do justices disagree?

- Originalism vs. Living Constitutionalism: Originalism is the idea that judges should follow the original meaning of the constitution. Living constitutionalism the idea that the constitution must grow and change with the people (the government is for the living, not the dead, and meaning of the constitution changes with each generation).

Original intent [study intention behind ruling, such as speeches and federal papers] vs. original meaning

Judicial Implementation
See Virgil Hawkings
 * 1) Interpretation - Judges and lawyers
 * 2) Implementing - Police/gov't
 * 3) Consumer population

Courts and Democracy
The Courts are not elected, hard to remove.