NAME:
LESSON:
TIME:
Number of students:
Materials required:
I.
A.
B.
II.
Carolyn Jewett
Overview of State and Federal Court Systems
50 minutes
Lesson designed for class of 26 students
Whiteboard markers, handout, lecture powerpoint, Jeopardy
powerpoint
GOALS: This class will help students:
Navigate state and federal court systems.
Follow current events concerning Supreme Court review on both state and federal
levels.
OBJECTIVES:
A.
Knowledge Objectives – As a result of this class, students will be better able to:
1.
Predict which court will hear a given controversy.
2.
Describe the path a state or federal case will take in the course of its appeals.
3.
Describe the discretionary function of Supreme Court review at state and federal
levels.
B.
Behavioral/Skills Objectives – As a result of this class, students will be better able to:
1.
Choose the correct court for pursuing litigation in their own lives - most likely at the
small claims level.
2.
Read and understand news reports concerning important cases where the U.S.
Supreme court has granted certiorari, and understand why certiorari itself is
newsworthy.
C.
Attitude Objectives – As a result of this class, students will feel that:
1. State and federal courts are structured similarly, but have different functions and
purposes in our judicial system.
2. They have recourse to resolve conflict even if the conflict is very small and concerns a
minimal amount of money in controversy.
3. Our state is an important part of a larger system and the national discourse on
constitutional law, and even seemingly minor state cases can have an impact on the
national level.
III.
CLASSROOM METHODS
Lecture:
Court systems of the U.S.
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Pass out the court systems handout. As you lecture, you should write on the
board in the same layout as the worksheet, and have the students fill in the
appropriate bubbles on their handouts. A sample completed worksheet is
included with this lesson plan to guide your board-writing. (You could also use a
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document camera and fill out the handout as you go along, but there is a
powerpoint, so figure out ahead of time how to switch between the document
camera and the powerpoint!) Let the students know that you will be playing a
game of Jeopardy at the end based on the lecture, so they should take notes!
In the U.S., we have two systems of government: the federal government and state
government.
- If you are writing on the white board, label two columns on the board,
“Washington State Court System” and “Federal Court System” at the top of the
board, to match the worksheet.
Each has their own sets of civil and criminal laws. [Students should have already
learned about the difference between civil and criminal laws in a previous lesson.] So
in Washington state we have:
o Write on the bottom of the board/handout: “Federal laws, U.S. Constitution”
under the right-hand Federal Court column, and separately “WA state laws,
WA state constitution” under the left-hand State Court column. Don’t draw
any arrows yet!
American Indian tribes have their own laws; they are not subject to state law, and
they are partially controlled by federal law but they are considered their own separate
nations. It’s a complicated area of the law. We’re just going to focus on state and
federal law.
If you have a problem dealing with state law or the state constitution, you’re going to
take that to a state trial court.
o In WA, we have a few different kinds of trial court. At the lowest level there’s
district court and municipal court.
▪ Write “District Court” and “Municipal Court” at the bottom of the
board, where the lowest bubble of the State Court column would be.
▪ Municipal court handles civil city law offenses. For instance, if run a
red light in downtown Seattle, you’ve broken a Seattle city law and if
you want to fight the ticket, you would take it to Seattle Municipal
Court. They also handle small misdemeanor crimes.
▪ (If you have done the No Vehicles in the Park lesson, remind the
students of that lesson That was a city ordinance. The cases would be
heard in municipal court.)
▪ District Court is similar, but on the county level. They handle violations
of state law - misdemeanor crimes and lawsuits for up to $75,000. A
lawsuit for less than $5,000 goes to a special division called “small
claims court.” No attorneys are needed in small claims court. (Judge
Judy & Court TV are small claims!)
▪ Add to the “District Court” and “Municipal Court” labels so they read
“King County District Court” and “Seattle Municipal Court.”
o The other type of trial court is Superior Court.
▪ Write “Superior Court” just above district and municipal, the next
highest bubble in the State Court column.
▪ That’s the court that handles bigger crimes, civil suits, family law
(divorces and child custody), and juvenile crime.
▪
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Each county has their own superior court. So if you were charged with
armed robbery in Seattle, you would go to trial in King County
Superior Court.
● Add “King County” to “Superior Court” label.
Ask: Does anybody know what court is above the state trial court?
o Write “Washington Court of Appeals” in the space above Superior Court.
(Note to students that in general it’s called “appellate court.”)
o In WA our Court of Appeals is split into 3 divisions. Does anybody know
which division Seattle is in?
▪ Write “Division I” after “WA Court of Appeals.”
▪ Show powerpoint slide of the divisions.
o If you have a civil or criminal trial in King County Superior Court, and you
want to appeal the result, you would file your appeal with the WA Court of
Appeals, Division I.
o When the appellate court makes a ruling on a particular legal issue, all the
trial courts beneath it have to follow that ruling.
o The three divisions are all supposed be united as one uniform court of
appeals, so technically the trial court has to follow a ruling from ANY of the
divisions. However, sometimes the divisions actually rule differently on
certain issues, and when it comes down to it, the trial court is going to be
most concerned about what their division is saying. The trial court does not
want its cases to get reversed on appeal.
▪ (You’ll explain how conflicts between the divisions get resolved in the
next section.)
o You have the right to appeal the trial court’s ruling, which means that the
Court of Appeals has to review all the appeals that are properly filed with
them. They don’t get to choose whether they think it’s worth reviewing.
Ask: Does anybody know what court is above the court of appeals?
o Write “Washington Supreme Court” above the Court of Appeals.
o So, if you don’t like the Court of Appeals’ ruling on your case, you can appeal
to the WA Supreme Court. Unlike the Court of Appeals, they don’t have to
grant you an appeal. They get tons of appeals from around the state, and
they basically try to choose the cases that they think are the most important –
maybe because it’s clear that the appellate court made a bad ruling, maybe
because it’s a legal issue that could have a really big impact on state law. If
the divisions of the Court of Appeals are coming out with really different
rulings on the same issues, the WA Supreme Court will usually try to take an
appeal on that issue and decide it one way or another so that everyone in the
state is following the same rules.
o Also, if you get sentenced to the death penalty, you can appeal directly to the
WA Supreme Court and skip the Court of Appeals!
Okay, so that is the state court system. The federal court system is very similar in a
lot of ways. Does anyone know what federal trial courts are called?
o They’re “U.S. District Court.”
o Yes, this is confusing with state district courts!
o Write, “U.S. District Court” at the bottom of the right-hand Federal Court
column.
It’s split up into 94 districts across the U.S.
▪ Show slide with map
▪ It was hard to find a good map of the districts, so hopefully you can
read this one. As you can see, the districts follow state borders, with
some states getting more than one district. If you can see the dotted
line, you can see that WA has two districts. CA has four. A lot of the
Midwestern states only have one district per state and the east coast
has a lot of districts.
o Does anybody know what the two Washington districts are called?
▪ Eastern District of WA and Western District of WA
▪ Which one is Seattle in?
▪ Write “Western District of WA” after U.S. District Court.
So that’s the trial court level. Can anybody guess what’s above the trial court?
o Write “U.S. Court of Appeals” above District Court.
o It’s split up into 13 Circuits. In this situation, “circuit” just means a large
district. 12 of the circuits are spread out over the states, and then there’s one
circuit just for Washington D.C.
o Anybody know what circuit Washington is in?
▪ Write “9th Circuit” after “U.S. Court of Appeals.”
▪ Show slide with circuit map.
▪ Notice the other states in the 9th Circuit.
▪ Not pictured on the map, it also covers the territories of Guam and the
Northern Mariana Islands.
▪ The 9th Circuit is kind of unusual because it’s so big. The circuits were
first designated in 1891, and at that time the western states weren’t
very populated, so there weren’t very many court cases coming
through the federal system out here. As new states were admitted to
the union, they threw them into the 9th Circuit too. Now there are
millions of people on the West Coast and the 9th Circuit is huge. There
have been lots of discussions about splitting it up into smaller circuits,
but it’s a very political issue and so far they’ve left it the way it is.
So that’s the federal appellate court. You guys can guess which court comes above
the U.S. Court of Appeals, right?
o Write “Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS)” at the top of the
Federal Court column.
o Sometimes in legal circles and blogs, the U.S. Supreme Court is referred to
as SCOTUS.
o Just like a state supreme court, they don’t have to review any appeals that
they don’t want to appeal. And since they get appeals from the entire nation,
they can only review a very small proportion of cases.
▪ It only hears about 100 cases per year, and it is asked to review about
8,000 cases per year.
▪ (Note: this estimate is from 2015, and this number gets bigger every
year, so make sure to look up the updated stats!)
Okay, so, now that we’ve outlined all the courts, let’s come back to the kinds of laws
we have down here at the bottom of the board.
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It seems like it would be straightforward, right? That state courts would hear state
laws and fed courts would hear fed laws.
o Draw an arrow from the state laws to the state courts, and from fed laws to
fed courts. Leave some room to write under the federal column, though!
- However, in any given case, sometimes more than one kind of law will apply. A lot of
the protections in our state constitution are modeled after the U.S. constitution, like
the right not to be searched unreasonably. If you’re suing because the police
unlawfully searched your home, you could have legal arguments about the WA
constitution and Fed constitution. Whichever court hears your case will have to
interpret both constitutions.
- So how does it actually work?
- State courts are what we call “courts of general jurisdiction.”
o This means they can hear cases dealing with pretty much any type of law.
There are a few exceptions (like copyright law, and bankruptcy court), but for
the most part, state courts can hear cases dealing with federal law and
interpret federal law.
▪ Draw an arrow from the fed laws to state courts.
o If your case has a federal law issue, and you take it to state court, and you
work your way up to the state supreme court, and you think the state
supreme court wrongly decided the federal issue, you can appeal to
SCOTUS. (Draw a dotted arrow from the State Supreme Court to SCOTUS)
- Federal courts are courts of “limited jurisdiction.”
o According to the US Constitution, here are only two kinds of cases they can
hear:
▪ 1. Write “Federal Question.” Cases where there is some sort of
federal law question. There can be state law issues in the case too,
but it has to have at least some federal law attached to it.
▪ 2. Write “Diversity.” Diversity cases. Lawsuits between two people
from two different states, if there’s more than $75,000 at stake.
● This was invented by the founding fathers because they were
worried that state court judges would be biased against people
from outside the state.
o The fed courts can still decide state law issues, they just have to be attached
to one of these two things. (Draw a dotted arrow from state law to the words
“Federal Question” and “Diversity”.)
Now it’s time to play JURISDICTION JEOPARDY! (Source for the hypothetical-based questions:
“Judges in the Classroom Lesson Plan,” Washington Courts website,
http://www.courts.wa.gov/education/lessons/?fa=education_lessons.dspPlan&plan=ClaimYourJ
urisdiction-1Day)
Jeopardy template from http://www.edtechnetwork.com/powerpoint.html
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Have students get into three groups and give each team a one-word team name.
Have students designate one person per group as the “buzzer,” who will jump up and
shout the team name when they have the answer. Just like in real Jeopardy, instruct
them to wait until you finish reading the question to answer! Use the Jeopardy
powerpoint to play Jeopardy. Since the squares do not change color on the
powerpoint Jeopardy square matrix, mark off on your grid below which questions
have been asked:
A
10
20
30
40
50
B
10
20
30
40
50
C
10
20
30
40
50
D
10
20
30
40
50
E
10
20
30
40
50
- Alternatively, have a student or fellow teacher write the questions that have been
asked already on the board next to the score (like A10, B40, etc).
IV. EVALUATION
V.
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Student contributions to the lecture and participation in the Jeopardy game.
HOMEWORK
None.
Washington State Court System
Federal Court System