Sean Hu

AP US Government and Politics

Due: March 15, 2016
I.

Chapter 14 Outline
The Federal Judicial System
A. The Supreme Court of the United States
i.
A courts jurisdiction is its authority to hear cases of a
particular type
ii.
Original jurisdiction is the authority to be the first court to
hear the case
1. The Supreme Courts original jurisdiction includes
legal disputes involving foreign diplomats and cases
in which the opposing parties are state governments
iii.
Appellate jurisdiction is the authority to review cases that
have already been heard in lower courts and are appealed
to a higher court by the losing party
iv.
Article III of the Constitution gives Congress the power to
create exceptions to the Courts appellate jurisdiction,
whereas its original jurisdiction is unalterable by Congress
B. Selecting and Deciding Cases
i.
Judicial review was first asserted by the Supreme Court in
Marbury v. Madison and it gives the court the ability to
declare another institutions action to be unconstitutional
ii.
Courts primary responsibility is to establish legal
precedents
1. A precedent is a judicial decision that serves as a
rule for settling subsequent cases of a similar nature
iii.
Writ of certiorari is a request to a lower court to submit to
the supreme Court a record of the case
C. Issuing Decisions and Opinions
i.
The decision indicates which party the Court supports and
by how much of a margin
ii.
The opinion explains the legal basis for the decisionthe
reasoning
iii.
The majority opinion is the side the majority of the justices
agree upon
iv.
Plurality opinion happens when there is no majority opinion
and it is the side the presents the view held by most of the
justices
v.
Concurring opinion is a separate view written by a justice
who votes with the majority but disagrees with its reasoning
vi.
The dissenting opinion is the losing side that explains its
reasons for disagreeing with the majority opinion
D. Other Federal Courts
i.
The US district court totals at 94 altogether with at least one
in every state and as many as four in some
1. Each district includes several judges and numbers
roughly seven hundred in all
ii.
A jury, consisted of regular private citizens, gives the verdict

iii.

II.

III.

IV.

The US Courts of Appeals receives no new evidence, instead

they make their decision on a review of the lower courts
records
1. They correct what they consider to be legal errors
iv.
There are thirteen courts of appeals
E. The State Courts
i.
In some states the governor appoints judges, but in most
states judges are elected to office
ii.
The merit plan proposes a governor appoints a judge from a
short list of acceptable candidates provided by a judicial
selection committee; at the first scheduled election after the
selected judge has served for a year, the voters by a simple
yes or no vote decide whether the judge should be
allowed to stay in office
iii.
More than 95% of the nations legal cases are decided by
state of local courts
iv.
The federal courts do not come into the picture because the
case does not involve a federal issue
Federal Court Appointees
A. Supreme Court Nominees
i.
They are nominated by the president and must be passed
through the Congress
B. Lower Court Nominees
i.
Senatorial courtesy is a tradition that dates back to the
1840s and it holds that a senator from the state in which a
vacancy has arisen should be consulted on the choice of the
nominee if the senator is of the same party as the president
ii.
They typically select members of their own party
C. Personal Backgrounds of Judicial Appointees
i.
Women and minority-group members are key constituencies
of the Democratic Party, and Democratic presidents have
appointed more judges from these groups than have
Republican presidents
The Nature of Judicial Decision Making
A. Legal Influence on Judicial Decisions
i.
The judiciary works within the context of three main sources
of law: the Constitution, legislative statues, and legal
precedents
ii.
Statutory law is legislative law
iii.
Administrative law is based on statutory law but is set by
government agencies rather than by legislatures
B. Political Influences on Judicial Decisions
i.
Law is not always a precise guide to judicial decisions, with
the result that judges often have some leeway in their
rulings
ii.
Some take a living constitution approach and others believe
the text is already written in stone and must be followed,
not open to interpretation
Judicial Power and Democratic Government

A.

Originalism versus Living Constitution Theory

i.
Originalism theory is a prominent philosophy that holds that
the Constitution should be interpreted in the way that a
reasonable person would have interpreted it at the time it
was written
ii.
Living Constitution Theory claim that the framers, through
the use of broad language and basic principles, intended the
Constitution to be an adaptable instrument; they cite the
preamble of the 1787 Constitutional Conventions
Committee of Detail
B. Judicial Restraint versus Judicial Activism
i.
Judicial restraint holds that judges should generally defer to
precedent and to decisions made by legislatures
1. They should apply the law rather than determine it
ii.
Judicial activism holds tha judges should actively interpret
the constitution, statues, and precedents in light of
fundamental principles and should intervene when elected
representatives fail to act in accord with these principles
iii.
In the past fifteen years or so, the supreme Court has struck
down more acts of Congress than were invalidated during
the previous half-century because of the conservativedominated, activist Court
C. What is the Judiciarys Proper Role?
i.
There is no conclusive way of settling the issue because the
Constitution does not specify the method by which judges
should arrive at their decisions