A Brief Lawsplainer of the Federal Court System

🧵With the flurry of federal litigation, I thought it would be helpful for the non-lawyers to provide a brief lawsplainer of federal court system. So, here it goes: Article III of the constitution established 1 Supreme court and such inferior courts as Congress may establish. 1/

— Margot Cleveland (@ProfMJCleveland) March 30, 2025

Currently there are 94 "district courts" and 13 "courts of appeals," named by their circuit, 1st Circuit Court of Appeals, Second Circuit Court of Appeals, through 11th Circuit. There is also a D.C. Circuit Court & a Federal Circuit.

"District court" is the name of the trial court level, where trials are held and if there is a jury trial, where you would have the jury. In the state court system they are called something different in every state, such as New York it's called the "Supreme Court."

Every state has at least one "district" court and some multiple. If you look at this map you can see Illinois has 3, a Northern District, a Central District, and a Southern District. In contrast, Michigan has an Eastern and Western district.

At district court level nearly always, 1 judge presides over case & if there is a trial, there's where it happens. Judge is randomly assigned but in district courts have "divisions" and in some divisions there is only 1 judges, so you file in that division you get that judge.

But you can't file anywhere: You can only file in a court that has "jurisdiction," i.e., power, over both the parties (personal jurisdiction) and the subject matter, i.e., type of case. Federal courts are courts of limited subject matter jurisdiction so you only certain cases can go to a federal court: Plaintiff suing over violation of federal constitution or federal statutes can go to federal court or plaintiff suing for violation of state laws (i.e., negligence, product's liability, etc.) where plaintiff & defendants are citizens of diff. states and damages > $75,000. (over simplification). All the Trump cases involve a federal question, either US constitution or federal statute so there is subject matter jurisdiction. Personal jurisdiction, means jurisdiction over "person" which for federal officials would be basically every state. BUT then you need "venue" meaning "best" location of all the locations and that typically is division where Plaintiff or Defendant resides. That's why it's easy to bring these cases in D.C. District Court because government resides there.

The district courts are the lowest level of federal courts. The losing party has a right to appeal to a federal appellate court, also called circuit courts, courts of appeals, or by their circuit name, i.e. 7th Circuit. Congress gave these appellate courts jurisdiction over appeals from district court's located within their borders. Again, look at the map. So the 7th Cir. (where I worked ~25 years) hears appeals from 7 district courts: E.D. WI, W.D. WI, N.D.ILL. C.D. Ill., S.D. Ill., and N.D. IN, & S.D. IN.

Appellate courts decide appeals, typically through 3 judge panels. No witnesses, no juries, just lawyers arguing to judges. Sometimes "entire" court sits which is "en banc" although 9th circuit is so large en banc is larger group of judges (11ish--not all of 20-plus judges.)

When a Court of Appeals issues a decision it is binding precedent and all lower courts within that circuit MUST follow the holding. So if the 5th Cir. decides a question, the N.D. of Texas must follow that holding but not the N.D. of IN. And 9th Cir. need not follow 3rd Cir.

When circuit courts disagree on law, it is called a "split in the circuits" and typically that will prompt the Supreme Court granting certiorari ("cert") to decide the issue. Supreme Court doesn't need to take a case, though, as in nearly all cases review is discretionary.

In addition to the circuits that hear appeals from district court, the federal circuit hears appeals regarding certain types of cases, like patents, or appeals from the "Court of Claims" (lawsuits against federal government for breach of contract).

D.C. Circuit hears appeals from the D.C. District Court. Also, the Circuit Courts of Appeals hear appeals from agencies, so aliens challenging there removals go from the immigration proceedings to the 7th Cir. for instance, or from the NLRB a dispute of unfair labor practices goes to the 6th Cir.

So, to bring this home: There have been more than 100 cases filed against Trump Administration throughout US in district courts. We now have about 20 cases that are at the appellate level.

Generally you can only appeal after the case is finished at the trial level but you can also appeal from a preliminary injunction. TYPICALLY a TRO (temporary restraining order) cannot be appealed, which is why we haven't had many appeals yet.

But as the TROs are turned into Preliminary Injunctions, they can be appealed. In reality though, the TROs are really Preliminary Injunctions which is Trump has tried to (and in some cases) succeeded on the appeals.

With appeals now moving forward, the circuit courts will start issuing mandatory precedent which means that the district courts will be required to follow that precedent. And so every time an appellate court slaps down an injunction, other similar injunctions will fall.

Obviously, there's much more detail to every point, but that summary should provide the basics.