Federal Court Basics
Part 001

You Are Welcome At The Court House1

Every citizen should take time to visit the U.S. Courthouse. During your visit, you'll see judges and their staff, jurors, lawyers, and people who are involved court cases. This pamphlet answers some of the questions visitors to federal courts ask most often. It will help you understand what you and hear in the courthouse. Of course, legal proceedings are often complex, and a pamphlet such as this may not answer all of your questions

In the back is a glossary of legal terms that you will  find in Part 16 of this section. You'll probably hear many of these terms if you attend a proceeding in the courthouse. If you’re confused by any of the words that appear in  boldface in this this section,  follow the link or look in the glossary for a simple explanation.

What Is a Court?

A court is an institution the government sets up to settle disputes through a legal process. People bring their disputes to court to resolve their disagreements: Did Bill Jones run a red light before his car ran  into John Smith's, or was the light green, as he says it was? Did Frank Williams rob the bank, or was it someone else?

Courts decide what really happened and what should be done about it. They decide whether a person committed a crime and what the punishment should be. They also provide a peaceful way to decide private disputes that people can't resolve themselves. Sometimes, a court decision affects other people in addition to those involved in the lawsuit. In 1965, three high school students in Des Moines, Iowa, were suspended from school for wearing black arm bands to protest the war in Vietnam They asked a court to declare the rule against arm bands invalid. I Supreme Court decided in the case, Tinker v. Des Moines School District that the rule violated the students' constitutional right of freedom expression.

That decision affected the right of public school students over the country to express their views in a nondisruptive manner. The Supreme Court's 1954 decision in Brown v. Board of Education had even more widespread effect. The case involved a dispute between t parents of Linda Brown and their local board of education in Topeka Kansas. The Court decided that requiring white children and black children to go to separate schools violated the Fourteenth Amendment of the constitution.

Federal Court Basics-Table of Contents  
Part 018-GLOSSARY   
Part 003-Map: Geographical Boundaries of U.S. Courts of Appeals and U.S. District Courts-pdf
Part 011-Diagram: The Federal‑State Court System-Map
 

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