United States Territorial Court

United States Territorial Court

The United States territorial courts are tribunals established in territories of the United States by the United States Congress, pursuant to its power under Article Four of the United States Constitution, the Territorial Clause. Most United States territorial courts are defunct because the territory under their jurisdiction have become states or been retroceded.

Among the United States territorial courts still in existence are:

• United States District Court for the Northern Mariana Islands
• District Court of Guam
• District Court of the Virgin Islands

Their jurisdiction is similar to that of a United States district court, but despite the name similarity, they are not "United States district courts" (though they sometimes use that term). A "United States district court", created under Article III of the U.S. Constitution, exists only in a United States federal judicial district, which is found only in the 50 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico.

The territorial courts themselves or article IV courts also assume the jurisdiction of a United States bankruptcy court in their respective territories; they do not have separate bankruptcy courts under their supervision, as do the article III U.S. district courts.

Article IV judges had not the authority to decide petitioners’ appeals or be appointed to a United States Court of Appeals. The U.S. Supreme Court case Nguyen v. United States, 539 U.S. 69 (2003) presented the question of whether a panel of the Court of Appeals consisting of two Article III judges and one Article IV judge had the authority to decide petitioners’ appeals. The U.S. Supreme court concluded it did not.