US Supreme Court

Essay by PaperNerd ContributorCollege, Undergraduate October 2001

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The U.S. Supreme Court decides many important cases a year. It is one of the most important aspects of the U.S. Government. In this Memo I plan to give you an insight on the U.S. Supreme court and how it works as a whole. Through doing this I will briefly describe how the supreme court works, and just some general information about the Supreme Court. I will also give you information on the 9 Supreme Court justices, the President who appointed them and their judicial views. With the new President, George W. Bush, people have been speculating on how he will affect the Supreme Court. I plan on addressing this issue as well.

I. Supreme Court A. General Information 1. The United States Supreme Court is the nation's highest court. Their foremost function is to review decisions of the Federal Courts of Appeals and the highest State courts.

2. The U.S. Supreme court consists of 9 justices.

3. There are 2 main ways a case can be heard in the Supreme Court.

a. Appeal by right is the least most common way for a case to reach the Supreme Court.

b. Writ of Certiorari is the most common way for a case to reach the Supreme Court. It requires a lower court to produce the records of a case it has tried. The vote of four justices is required for the granting of a writ, which is called the rule of four.

4. The U.S. Supreme court is an Article 3 Court.

a. The Justices of the Supreme Court serve for life. Their are only three ways they can be removed; Death, impeachment or retirement.

B. Current Justices of the Supreme Court 1. Stephen G. Breyer a. Nominated by Bill Clinton b. He is accused of siding too...