Structure of the Federal Judicial System And Responsibility Of Each Part Of The System

.  Explain the structure of the federal judicial system.  What are the responsibilities of each part of the system?

The U.S. federal court systemoffers a three-level structure:

District courts — The U.S. is apportioned into 91 federal judicial districts and each of those states has at least 1 district court. The district court deals with cases that the United States is a party or those involving a federal or constitutional issue (Howard, 2014).

Courts of appeals — The federal system is also made of 13 appellate courts and approximately 150 federal judges, spread across the country. Judges are usually divided into many three-judge panels that rotate around the courts. Occasionally, the entire appellate hears an “en banc” case (Howard, 2014).

Supreme Court — The U.S. Supreme Court accepts numerous appeals, from both the courts of appeal and the state supreme appellate, but only accepts a few cases annually. Cases dealt with in this court usually involve divergencesof legal interpretations and thus theyare of substantial importance to federal law (Howard, 2014).

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