State Courts
In the United States, many state court systems are divided into divisions such as criminal, civil law, family, and probate. A court within any one of those divisions would lack subject-matter jurisdiction to hear a case regarding matters assigned to another division. Most U.S. state court systems, however, include a superior court that has "general" jurisdiction; that is, it is competent to hear any case over which no other tribunal has exclusive jurisdiction. Because the United States federal courts have exclusive jurisdiction over a very small percentage of cases, such as copyright disputes, patent disputes, and United States bankruptcy court disputes, state courts have the authority to hear the vast majority of cases.
Read more about this topic: Subject-matter Jurisdiction
Famous quotes containing the words state and/or courts:
“So that the life of a writer, whatever he might fancy to the contrary, was not so much a state of composition, as a state of warfare; and his probation in it, precisely that of any other man militant upon earth,—both depending alike, not half so much upon the degrees of his WIT—as his RESISTANCE.”
—Laurence Sterne (1713–1768)
“A day in thy courts is better than a thousand.”
—Bible: Hebrew Psalms, 84:10.