·
Article
III of the Constitution authorizes the creation of a Supreme Court and all
lower courts.
·
Judiciary
Act of September 24, 1789 established the Supreme Court.
·
One
Chief Justice and eight Associate Justices (judges) serve on the Supreme Court.
·
Justices
serve for life, until they retire.
·
When
a Justice retires, the President of the United States nominates a new member of
the Supreme Court.
·
The
United States Senate holds hearings to confirm the nomination (agree that the
person would be a good justice.)
·
If
the Senate votes to accept the nomination, the President appoints the judge to
the Supreme Court.
·
In
the Supreme Court, a year is called a “term.”
·
A
term begins on the first Monday of October and goes to the first Monday of
October the following year.
·
At
the end of June the Supreme Court takes a summer break. No cases are heard during this break.
The kind of cases the Supreme Court hears
·
The
Supreme Court hears cases when the Bill of Rights have been violated. The Bill of Rights are the first ten
amendments to the Constitution.
·
Most
of the cases that the Supreme Court hears are cases that have been heard by all
of the lower courts. When a case is
reviewed by a higher court, it’s called an appeal.
·
Since
the cases are appeals and the justices have all the records, they don’t have a
jury or witnesses. Instead the justices
hear arguments from both sides.
·
Justices
of the Supreme Court are responsible for listening to the arguments from each
side. They form an opinion and all of
the justices vote on the case.
·
When
the justices don’t agree, the majority rules.
The justices in the majority write and present their opinion. The justices who don’t agree with the
majority may write a “minority opinion” to explain their position.
·
Justices
must also look at petitions (requests) for cases to go before the Supreme
Court, and decide which ones they will hear in the future.
·
The
Supreme Court protects citizens when their Constitutional rights have been
violated.
·
Decisions
made by the Supreme Court change the laws.
Supreme Court Cases That Affect our Lives
· Plessy v. Ferguson, 1896 – guaranteed that the Bill of Rights applied to African Americans
· Korematsu v. U.S., 1944 – gave the military the power to do things in a time of war that it could not do during peace time, like detain citizens because of their ethnicity
· Brown v. Board of Education, 1954 – ordered segregation in schools to stop, because separate schools did not provide the same education to all students
· Mapp v. Ohio, 1961 – extended the Exclusionary Rule to states, disallowing in court any evidence found by police without a warrant
· Gideon v. Wainwright, 1963 – required states to provide an attorney to defendants who could not afford one
· Griswold v. Connecticut, 1965 – gave privacy rights to married partners, including the right to choose birth control and abortion
·
Miranda v. Arizona, 1966 – required police to tell citizens their rights
when they are arrested (now called the Miranda Warning)
· Roe v. Wade, 1973 – prevented states from interfering in a woman’s decision to have an abortion
· New Jersey v. TLO, 1985 – allowed schools to search students without a search warrant
· Texas v. Johnson, 1989 – protected citizens’ right to burn the United States flag as part of a protest
Written
by Deanne M. Braveman, a volunteer at The Literacy Project and a Political
Science major at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.