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Subject-matter jurisdiction, also called jurisdiction ratione materiae, [1] is a legal doctrine regarding the ability of a court to lawfully hear and adjudicate a case. . Subject-matter relates to the nature of a case; whether it is criminal, civil, whether it is a state issue or a federal issue, and other substantive features of th
Criminal jurisdiction is a term used in constitutional law and public law to describe the power of courts to hear a case brought by a state accusing a defendant of the commission of a crime. It is relevant in three distinct situations: to regulate the relationship between states, or between one state and another;
When a case is between two or more states, the Supreme Court holds both original and exclusive jurisdiction, and no lower court may hear such cases. In one of its earliest cases, Chisholm v. Georgia, [2] the court found this jurisdiction to be self-executing, so that no further congressional action was required to permit the court to exercise ...
In the United States, a state court is a law court with jurisdiction over disputes with some connection to a U.S. state.State courts handle the vast majority of civil and criminal cases in the United States; the United States federal courts are far smaller in terms of both personnel and caseload, and handle different types of cases.
Certain courts, particularly the United States Supreme Court and most state supreme courts, have discretionary jurisdiction, meaning that they can choose which cases to hear from among all the cases presented on appeal. Such courts generally only choose to hear cases that would settle important and controversial points of law. Though these ...
Four Justices must agree to hear a case for the Court to take it up. The Supreme Court receives about 7,000 to 8,000 petitions filed each term, and will decide about 80 cases on average.
In the Supreme Court case, the only provision of the federal criminal code at issue is 18 U.S.C. 1512(c)(2), which criminalizes any effort to “corruptly” obstruct, influence or impede any ...
District courts are courts of law, equity, and admiralty, and can hear both civil and criminal cases. But unlike U.S. state courts, federal district courts are courts of limited jurisdiction, and can only hear cases that involve disputes between residents of different states, questions of federal law, or federal crimes.