Retail and commerce would be paralyzed if businesses could not rely on the courts to enforce their rights. In fact, companies rely heavily on the courts to protect their contracts and property rights. If companies cannot expect to be able to take legal action if necessary, there can be no certainty that legal and contractual obligations will be met. In general, Congress determines the jurisdiction of federal courts. However, in some cases, such as a dispute between two or more U.S. states, the Constitution grants the Supreme Court jurisdiction in the first instance, an authority that cannot be removed by Congress. To discuss the federal rules of evidence, try the sources above for general federal practice. Weinstein`s Federal Evidence: Commentary on Rules of Evidence for the United States Courts (no longer updated in print in the library, but online in Lexis Advance) is an electronic service that contains comments on each rule. There is also a version of Weinstein`s Evidence for students, which can be found online as Weinstein`s Evidence Manual in Lexis Advance.
Other important treatises on the law of evidence are The New Wigmore: A Treatise on Evidence (library signature varies by sub-theme) and McCormick on Evidence, 7th edition (Reserves KF8935. M131 2013). Although no longer updated in the printed edition of the library, the Federal Rule of Evidence Service (KF8933. Q42) The filer volumes contain decisions of federal courts and agencies interpreting the rules up to volume 95 (2015). Although the Supreme Court can hear an appeal on any point of law, provided it has jurisdiction, it does not generally hold a trial. Rather, the Court`s task is to interpret the meaning of a statute, to decide whether a statute is relevant to a particular situation, or to decide how a statute is to be applied. Lower courts are required to follow Supreme Court jurisprudence when making decisions. Each State has judicial rules that govern the functioning of its courts. Since 1939, many states have adopted rules of procedure based on federal rules, and many states have shaped their rules of evidence around federal rules since they were adopted.
Court rules refer to the procedures or regulations that govern court proceedings. The ordinary courts have the power to hear claims as long as there is controversy between parties with different interests and conflicting claims. There are additional requirements for controversy, depending on the type of court in which the application is filed. Not all claims can be filed in all courts. Each court has a specific jurisdiction and categories of disputes can be excluded on the basis of the value of the dispute. For example, in federal courts, if jurisdiction is based on diversity of citizenship, the amount in dispute must exceed $75,000. (See 28 U.S.C. § 1332). The text of court decisions interpreting procedural rules is usually printed in the same reports that usually cover court decisions and can be accessed online and printed using traditional case search methods. Two other sources of decisions interpreting the Federal Court rules are: Federal Rules Service (KE8816.
A198, updated February 2015). This loose-leaf service focuses exclusively on decisions interpreting the codes of civil procedure. It contains three useful sections: (1) Federal Rules Service volumes contain the wording of all federal court decisions interpreting the Federal Code of Civil Procedure. Indexing has been done since the beginning of the service in 1939. Since 1968, cases interpreting the rules of appeal procedure have also been included; (2) The Federal Rules Digest contains summaries of decisions in an order based on the official rule numbers and editorial commentaries; (3) The “Finding aids” volume contains the text of the rules, a thematic index and a table of cases. Another useful strategy for finding historical court rules is to search the online catalog and then manipulate the search results. For the following keywords, sort your results from oldest to most recent and limit the results to Goodson Law Library funds: Civil Procedure – United States; Rules of Court – United States; Criminal procedure – United States; Evidence (law)–United States. The court manuals published for each state contain the local rules of the federal district courts of that state, as well as the district court of appeals of that jurisdiction.
Annual manuals are published for some countries. These are located with status codes (level 3). For example, North Carolina Rules of Court (State Codes & NC Alcove), published by West, is divided into two volumes — one for the rules of the courts of North Carolina and one for the local rules of the federal district courts of North Carolina and the Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. North Carolina General Statutes, Annotated Rules (State Codes & NC Alcove), published by Lexis, includes annotated state judicial rules and uncommented federal rules for the same courts. Federal appeals are decided by panels of three judges. The complainant makes legal arguments to the Panel in a written document called “oral argument”. In the oral argument, the plaintiff tries to convince the judges that the trial court erred and that the lower decision should be overturned. On the other hand, the defendant of the appeal, known as the “appellant” or “defendant”, tries to demonstrate in its argument why the decision of the trial court was correct or why the errors made by the trial court are not significant enough to influence the outcome of the case.
State court rules are sometimes published in annotated editions of state laws with citations of decisions interpreting the rules. The text and annotations of most rules are available online through legal research services Lexis Advance, Westlaw and Bloomberg Law. On Lexis Advance, you can find the rules of all types of federal courts by following the path Laws and Laws > Judicial Rules. On Westlaw, search the Statutes & Court Rules database, which is linked to the search home page. On Bloomberg Law, follow the browse path Browse all content > Litigation & Dockets > Court Rules. If the court grants certiorari, the judges accept the pleadings of the parties to the case, as well as those of the amicus curiae or “friends of the court.” This can include industry trade groups, academics, or even the U.S. government itself. Before rendering a judgment, the Supreme Court usually hears oral arguments in which the various parties to the application present their arguments and the judges ask them questions. When the case involves the federal government, the U.S. Attorney General makes arguments on behalf of the United States. The judges then hold private lectures, make their decision, and (often after a period of several months) deliver the court`s opinion as well as any dissenting arguments that may have been written. Updating court rules is more difficult outside of first-rate legal research services.
LexisNexis Academic, the campus-wide version of Lexis Advance, includes Shepard`s for jurisdiction, but does not allow users to update citations from federal or state courts. However, the Law Library has updated printed copies of the state`s Shepard`s North Carolina citations (NC Alcove, Level 3) that include references for federal and state court rules.