United States Federal Judicial District
For purposes of the federal judicial system, Congress has divided the United States into judicial districts. There are 94 federal judicial districts, including at least one district in each state, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. Three territories of the United States — the Virgin Islands, Guam, and the Northern Mariana Islands — have district courts that hear federal cases, including bankruptcy cases. The breakdown of what is in each judicial district is at 28 U.S.C. §§ 81–131.
Federal judicial districts have also been established in the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. Courts in other insular areas are territorial courts under Article I of the Constitution, not United States district courts, although they have similar jurisdiction.
Only two districts have jurisdiction over areas outside the state in which the court sits:
- The District of Wyoming includes all of Yellowstone National Park, including areas in Montana and Idaho.
- The District of Hawaii includes Midway Island, Palmyra Island, and a number of other uninhabited Pacific island possessions of the United States.
Each district has its own United States district court (with a bankruptcy court under its authority), including judges, clerks, court reporters, and other support personnel, all employed by the judicial branch of the government and overseen by the Administrative Office of the Courts in Washington, D.C. There is also a United States Attorney in each district, who acts as the federal government's lawyer in the district, both prosecuting federal criminal cases and defending the government (and its employees) in civil suits against them; the U.S. Attorney is not employed by the judicial branch but by the Department of Justice, part of the executive branch. There is also a Federal Public Defender who represents people charged with federal crimes who cannot afford to hire their own lawyers; some FPDs cover more than one judicial district. Each district also has a United States Marshal who serves the court system.
Read more about United States Federal Judicial District: List of Districts
Famous quotes containing the words united states, united, states, federal, judicial and/or district:
“Some of the offers that have come to me would never have come if I had not been President. That means these people are trying to hire not Calvin Coolidge, but a former President of the United States. I can’t make that kind of use of the office.... I can’t do anything that might take away from the Presidency any of its dignity, or any of the faith people have in it.”
—Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933)
“An inquiry about the attitude towards the release of so-called political prisoners. I should be very sorry to see the United States holding anyone in confinement on account of any opinion that that person might hold. It is a fundamental tenet of our institutions that people have a right to believe what they want to believe and hold such opinions as they want to hold without having to answer to anyone for their private opinion.”
—Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933)
“Our citizenship in the United States is our national character. Our citizenship in any particular state is only our local distinction. By the latter we are known at home, by the former to the world. Our great title is AMERICANS—our inferior one varies with the place.”
—Thomas Paine (1737–1809)
“Daniel as a lad bought a handkerchief on which the Federal Constitution was printed; it is said that at intervals while working in the meadows around this house, he would retire to the shade of the elms and study the Constitution from his handkerchief.”
—For the State of New Hampshire, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)
“Scarcely any political question arises in the United States that is not resolved, sooner or later, into a judicial question.”
—Alexis de Tocqueville (1805–1859)
“Most works of art, like most wines, ought to be consumed in the district of their fabrication.”
—Rebecca West (1892–1983)