Overview of the American Legal System
| Author | Jeffrey Wilson |
| Pages | xiii-xxvi |
The legal system of the United States is administered and carried on by the official branches of government and many other authorities acting within their official lawmaking capacity. The original basis of the law in this country is the United States Constitution, which lays the framework under which each of the different branches of government operates. The Constitution also guarantees the basic civil rights of the citizens of the United States. All authority of the federal government originates from the Constitution, and the Constitution serves as the supreme law of the land. The Constitution grants to the federal government certain enumerated powers, and grants to the states any power not specifically delegated to a branch of the federal government. Under this system, states retain significant authority and autonomy. The Constitutions in each of the fifty states contain many similar provisions to those in the U.S. Constitution in terms of the basic structure of government. Under the federal and state constitutions, the United States legal system consists of a system of powers separated among branches of government, with a system of checks and balances among these branches.
The legislative branch is the primary law-making body among the three branches, although authority emanating from the other branches also constitutes law. The legislative branch consists of Congress, and is subdivided into two lower houses, the House of Representatives and the Senate. In addition to the powers granted to Congress, the Constitution sets forth specific duties of both the House and the Senate. Each Congress meets for two sessions, with each session lasting two years. For example, the 107th Congress met in its first session in 2001, and meets in its second session in 2002. State legislatures are structured similarly, with the vast majority of these legislatures consisting of two lower houses.
The judicial branch in the federal system consists of three levels of courts, with the Supreme Court serving as the highest court in the land. The intermediate courts in the federal system are the thirteen Courts of Appeals. The United States is divided by circuits, with each circuit consisting of a number of states. The Fifth Circuit, for example, consists of Texas, Mississippi, and Louisiana. Each Court of Appeals has jurisdiction to decide federal cases in its respective circuit. The trial level in the federal judicial system consists of the District Courts. Each state contains at least one district, with larger states containing as many as four districts. Congress has also established a number of lower federal courts with specialized jurisdiction, such as the bankruptcy courts and the United States Tax Court.
Most state court systems are similar to that of the federal system, with a three-tiered system consisting of trial courts, appellate courts, and a highest court, which is also referred to as a "court of last resort." The names of the courts are similar from state to state, such as superior court, court of appeals, and supreme court. However, some states do not follow this structure. For example, in New York, the trial level court is the Supreme Court, while the court of last resort is the Court of Appeals. Texas, as another example, has two highest courts—the Supreme
Court and the Court of Criminal Appeals. In addition to the trial level courts, small claims courts or other county courts typically hear small claims, such as those seeking recovery of less than $1000.
The federal Constitution vests executive power in the President of the United States. The President also serves as the Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces and has the power to make treaties with other nations, with the advice and consent of the Senate. Besides those powers enumerated in Article II of the Constitution, much of the power of the executive branch stems from the executive departments, such as the Department of the Treasury and the Department of Justice. Congress has the constitutional authority to delegate power to administrative agencies, and many of these agencies fall under the executive branch and are known as executive agencies. Congress also has the authority to create agencies independent of the other branches of government, called independent agencies. Authority emanating from executive and independent agencies is law, and it is similar in many ways to legislation created by legislatures or opinions issued by courts. State executive branches and administrative agencies are similar to those of their federal counterparts.
The federal Constitution is not a particularly lengthy document, and does not provide many answers to specific questions of law. It has, instead, been the subject of extensive interpretation since its original ratification. In the famous 1803 case of Marbury v. Madison, Chief Justice John Marshall wrote an opinion of the Supreme Court, which stated that the judicial branch was the appropriate body for interpreting the Constitution and determining the constitutionality of federal or state legislation. Accordingly, determining the extent of power among the three branches of government, or determining the rights of the citizens of the United States, almost always requires an evaluation of federal cases, in addition to a reading of the actual text of the Constitution.
Most of the enumerated congressional powers are contained in section 8 of Article I of the Constitution. Many courts have been asked to review congressional statutes to determine whether Congress had the constitutional authority to enact such statutes. Among these powers, the power of Congress "to regulate [c]ommerce among the several [s]tates" has been the subject of the most litigation and outside debate. A number of cases during the New Deal era under President Franklin D. Roosevelt considered the breadth of this provision, which is referred to as the Commerce Clause. After the Supreme Court determined that many of these statutes were unconstitutional, Roosevelt, after a landslide election in 1936, threatened to add additional justices to the court, in order to provide more support for his position with respect to the pieces of legislation passed during the New Deal era (the reason he gave to Congress at the time was that many of the justices were over the age of seventy, and could no longer perform their job function, but the general understanding was that he wanted justices that would approve the New Deal legislation as constitutional). The threat of this so-called "Court-packing" plan succeeded, and the Commerce Clause has been construed very broadly since then. Other powers enumerated in Article I are generally construed broadly as well.
The main text of the Constitution does not provide rights to the citizens of the United States. These rights are generally provided in the many amendments to the Constitution. The first ten amendments, all ratified in 1791, are called the "Bill of Rights," and confer many of the cherished and fundamental rights to the citizens of the United States. Among the rights included in the Bill of Rights are the freedoms of speech and religion (First Amendment); right to keep and bear arms (Second Amendment); right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures (Fourth Amendment); right to be free from being compelled to testify against one's self in a criminal trial (Fifth Amendment); right to due process of law (Fifth Amendment); right to a jury trial (Sixth Amendment); and right to be free from cruel and unusual punishment (Eighth Amendment).
Between 1791 and 1865, no constitutional amendments were ratified that provided civil rights to citizens. However, at the conclusion of the Civil War and during the reconstruction period following the war, three major amendments were added to the Constitution. The first was the Thirteenth Amendment, ratified in 1865, which finally abolished slavery and involuntary servitude in the United States. The Fourteenth Amendment, ratified in 1868, provided some of the...
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