Legal Terms: The U.S. Legal System

civil right

a legally enforceable right or privilege, which interfered with by another gives rise to an action for injury

• the basis for a legal action that seeks some remedy for harms resulting from that interference

• allows someone to sue individuals, businesses, or the government itself for relief, with the backing of government enforcement

• legal provisions that stem from notions of equality

e.g. non-discrimination protections based on protected class

civil liberties

personal freedoms protected from government intrusion

• only concern the prohibition of certain government actions, but generally do not concern private individuals, businesses, or others’ actions

e.g. the rights & freedoms provided in the Bill of Rights

common law

law that is established through custom and judicial precedents – customary behaviors and norms of legal practice, plus past decisions of courts

• in contrast to “statutory law” (laws passed through regular legislative procedures)

federalism

an approach toward organizing government combining a central or “federal” government with smaller, sub-national governments among which governmental powers
are divided

• in the U.S. system, includes a combination of powers reserved to each level of government alone—national versus states—along with powers shared by and overlapping among the two

judicial review

a doctrine of American law where the federal judicial branch has authority to review actions of other governmental actors, including executive, administrative, and legislative acts, policies, regulations, laws, etc.

• entails judges’ assessments of whether those actions
  taken by other governmental actors are consistent with the Constitution and existing legal precedents
  (i.e., the common law)

• if actions are determined to violate one or more constitutional principles or other legal precedents, then the courts have authority to declare them unconstitutional, in whole or in part, under this doctrine

• the federal judiciary, including the U.S. Supreme Court, can make such declarations with respect to both state-level and federal actors’ decisions and actions.

jurisdiction

the official authority to make binding decisions about the law

• for federal courts, also the authority of a court to hear and decide outcomes of cases, as defined under the Constitution and other federal laws

subject matter jurisdiction

jurisdiction ratione materiae

a court’s authority to decide cases on the basis of the subject or content of the case being brought before that court

• many states have different courts for different legal issues (e.g. civil, criminal, family, probate)

• federal judiciary has specialized courts hearing cases involving patents, trademarks, and other intellectual property-related disputes; cases involving personal or corporate bankruptcies; cases involving international trade disputes; etc.

can be established via federal question jurisdiction or diversity jurisdiction

federal question jurisdiction

when a federal court has authority to hear cases arising under the U.S. Constitution, federal laws, or both

• must be presented in a case for a federal court to hear it and render judgment

diversity jurisdiction

when a federal court has authority to hear a case based on requirements under federal law

requirements:

1. feature “complete diversity” of parties involved in the case (no plaintiff and defendant are from the same U.S. state)

2. involve at least $75,000 in monetary claims (i.e., the “jurisdictional amount” or “amount in controversy” claimed by a plaintiff filing suit must meet this threshold)

original jurisdiction

when a court has authority to hear and decide a case for the first time

• courts with this hear cases in full, including review of evidence and testimony, and decide the outcome of a case for the first time

appellate jurisdiction

higher courts’ authority to review lower courts’ decisions after one or more parties have sought appeal

discretionary jurisdiction

appellate courts have this over reviews of lower-courts’ decisions – they can reject an appeal claim and, in the case of the U.S. Supreme Court, may accept only a very small number of appeals

• appellate courts can review questions of fact and/or questions of law

justiciability

the question of whether a federal court has authority to hear a particular case brought to them.

• previous principles of jurisdiction + other considerations e.g. constitutional principles, prudential concerns

• limited by constitutional principles

actual controversy requirement

the parties to the case are seeking different and at least somewhat
opposed/conflicting outcomes

• constitutional principle limiting justiciability

political question doctrine

forbids federal courts from hearing cases involving “political questions” that fall under the purview of the political branches, i.e., the executive and/or legislative branches

• constitutional principle limiting justiciability

prudential concerns

those cases in which contextual factors make it inappropriate for the courts to intervene, in which granting access to the courts would overwhelm their capacity, or in which a court’s decision would upset the system of checks and balances

• e.g. forbidding third-party standing, rule against generalized grievances

  • TPS: you cannot be a party to a case on behalf of someone else

  • GGs: abstract claims of harm that apply to everyone, or some large segment of the American public

ripeness

pertaining to timing of a case being brought to court

(a) parties must demonstrate that an actual harm has occurred or is imminent, and/or

(b) non-judicial alternatives for resolving a conflict must be exhausted

mootness

when at least one of the parties already has lost their claim because (among other possible reasons) their claimed injury has ceased or already been remedied, or when the cause of their injury no longer exists

final appellate jurisdiction

SCOTUS-specific jurisdiction over all other federal courts and, for cases involving federal-law-related or constitutional questions, all of the state courts

• this jurisdiction is discretionary

discretionary jurisdiction

SCOTUS is not required to hear any given case presented to it through an appeal, but rather may grant cert and accept appeals on a case-by-case basis

• SCOTUS also has original jurisdiction over certain kinds of cases identified in Article III, eg. lawsuits between two or more of the states, cases involving ambassadors and other specified officials

reliance

the notion of “reliance interests,” or the use of court decisions and precedents by everyday people in making decisions

• precedent allows people to rely on judicial decisions to form expectations about their legal rights and duties into the future

standard of review

how appellate courts review decisions of lower courts

• dependent on:

  • whether the appeal is based on questions of fact or questions of law

  • whether (and if so, which) constitutional principles are involved in a dispute

  • whether the case addresses private conduct (as in a lawsuit between two individuals) or challenges state actors/actions (as in enforcement actions of the executive branch or Congress-drafted laws)

• determines how much deference the appellate court will give to the lower court(s) that first heard the case

deference

the extent to which a reviewing court defers to the judgement of a lower court

no substantial evidence

one standard of review for an appellate court’s overturning of a lower court’s ruling

• almost literally no evidence exists on the basis of which the conclusion could reasonably be reached)

clearly erroneous

one standard of review for an appellate court’s overturning of a lower court’s ruling

• evidence is provided for the conclusion, but that evidence is specious or contradicted and heavily outweighed by other evidence, and so is an objectively unreasonable basis for the case’s outcome

de novo review

one major standard of review for an appellate court’s overturning of a lower court’s ruling

• an appellate court hears and reviews a lower court’s decision as though the key question(s) in the case were being addressed for the first time → no deference

• almost always used in appellate cases addressing questions of law

• generally the standard of review used by SCOTUS

abuse of discretion

one major standard of review for an appellate court’s overturning of a lower court’s ruling

• a lower court judge’s discretionary decision or ruling is at issue

• refer to the many decisions made by trial court judges on the basis of their own judgment, the interest of fairness, etc

• may include a judge’s decision to admit or exclude evidence presented during trial, grant extensions to filing deadlines, and waive fees or deadlines for a party experiencing some hardship, etc.

• a trial court judge’s discretionary ruling will only be reversed on appeal if it was done in “plain error,” meaning it was “patently obviously” wrongly decided and the decision affected a party’s substantial rights (such as core civil rights and liberties, or some other right or interest they might claim under federal, state, the common law, etc.).

standard of scrutiny

there are three; SCOTUS applies in addition to de novo standard of review when cases involve challenges to the constitutionality of a government action or a federal law in and of itself

rational basis review

most deferential standard of scrutiny; default standard

• executive action or legislation will not be overturned if it has any “reasonable relationship” to any “legitimate government interest”

  • “legitimate government interest” has not been explicitly defined or given a single, general standard of its own by the Court, but it has been viewed very broadly — can be any claim put forward by the government as to the goal served by a law, regardless of whether it’s a demonstrably “real” claim or not, or even in cases where it’s entirely hypothetical

• if any legislator drafting a law believed or could have believed that its requirements or restrictions had any relationship to some legitimate aim, then the Court must uphold that law

strict scrutiny review

least deferential standard of scrutiny

• executive action or legislation is
  presumptively unconstitutional and therefore forbidden unless the government proves:

  • the challenged law is necessary to achieve

  • a compelling state interest and

    • goal so important that it may override core constitutional rights and liberties

  • the mechanism for achieving that compelling interest is narrowly tailored so as to minimally affect individuals’ constitutional rights and liberties

    • must avoid overbreadth and vagueness

• applied in two situations:

  • when the challenged enforcement or legislation infringes a fundamental constitutional right (i.e., one in the Bill of Rights, or one established in precedent as “fundamental” and protected by the Fifth and/or Fourteenth Amendments); and

  • when the government action defines, singles out, and applies a suspect classification (“suspect class”) that has been established to require this type of review

    • eg. race, national origin, religion, alienage

intermediate scrutiny

moderately deferential standard of scrutiny

• applied to laws discriminating on the basis of “quasi-suspect” classifications

  • eg. sex/gender, illegitimacy

• government must proved that challenged law:

  • furthers an important government interest and

  • uses means substantially related to the important government interest

stare decisis

“let stand” — legal principle that judges should respect established precedent

• primarily concerns binding precedents

binding precedent

a precedent that must be followed in the future — the essential decision or conclusive interpretation that a court makes in a case, effectively declaring “what the law is” (the holding of a case)

• criteria

  • decided by that same court

  • decided by a higher appellate court with authority over the same court

persuasive precedent

a precedent that may be used by judges in deciding a case but do not bind them in a legal sense

• eg. precedent from a court outside the Circuit

statute

a federal law passed by Congress and codified in the Code of Laws of the United States of America

writ of certiorari/cert

a legal recognition granted by SCOTUS when it decides to accept a petition on appeal

• when a party makes an appeal to SCOTUS, at least 4 justices must vote to grant __ to accept the case