Federal Circuit

“ The federal courts are bound hand and foot, and are compelled and obliged by the federal legislature to obey the state law; and according to this law the judgment of the circuit court was correct, and is, therefore, affirmed. ”

“ Under existing laws the circuit courts have no jurisdiction whatever to re-examine the judgments of the State courts in any case, civil or criminal, the power to exercise such a revision even in civil cases involving Federal questions, being vested exclusively in the Supreme Court. Neither the Supreme Court nor the circuit courts can re-examine the conviction, sentence, or judgment of the District Court in a criminal case in any form, either by writ of error or appeal. ”

“ VI. The Progressive Era: Structural Reforms and Democracy-Based Critiques of the Courts
A. Reorganization of the Federal Courts
As a result of the structural reforms of the Reconstruction era, the dockets of the federal courts—and in particular the Supreme Court—became crowded “beyond all control.” [96] A small reprieve came from Congress in an 1869 statute that created circuit judgeships, one for each of the nine circuits. [97] The circuit-riding obligations of the Justices were also reduced. But it was not enough to stem the tide of litigation in federal court. ”

“ Conflicts within a circuit will be avoided. Finality of decision in the circuit courts of appeal will be promoted. Those considerations are especially important in view of the fact that in our federal judicial system these courts are the courts of last resort in the run of ordinary cases. Such considerations are, of course, not for us to weigh in case Congress has devised a system where the judges of a court are prohibited from sitting en banc. ”

“ In a majority of the existing States, there have been created more than one district court, invested with circuit court jurisdiction. If this privilege of forcing upon the supreme court the original decision of causes instituted in the circuit courts be legitimate, it appertains to every court possessing circuit court jurisdiction existing in the States already members of the confederacy, and must appertain equally to any number however augmented. ”

“ Unaffected as the Judiciary Act is by the latest of the three acts mentioned, the law still is that if the suit is commenced against an alien in a State court, he may file a petition for the removal of the same for trial into the next Circuit Court to be held in the district, at the time of entering his appearance in such State court. Non-resident defendants or alien defendants may also remove certain causes from a State court into a Circuit Court for trial, under the intermediate act of Congress, as before explained. ”

“ It is not denied that under the constitutional provision as to the judicial power, Congress might, if they had thought proper, have given to the Circuit Courts jurisdiction of all cases between citizens of one or more states on one side, and citizens of one or more other states on the other side, as, for example, a case in which some of the plaintiffs should be citizens of New York, and some of them citizens of New Jersey, and some of the defendants citizens of South Carolina, and some citizens of North Carolina. ”

“ It has not only produced a conflict among the circuits, but has provoked practical difficulties in the administration of criminal justice and caused expressions of dissatisfaction even in courts that have sustained an appeal. Although only the Fourth and Fifth Circuits have clearly departed from the Second Circuit's view, [6] the consensus in the others is far from unwavering. [7] The First Circuit, for example, has declined to permit pretrial entertainment of any suppression motions other than those explicitly authorized by the language of Rule 41 (e) . ”

“ The Court has consistently held to the view that it cannot overrule the determination of Congress as to whether federal courts should be allowed jurisdiction, concurrent with the State courts, even where the plaintiff seeks to restrain action of a State agency. ”