Chapter 1.0. The Federal Judiciary, Introduction

The Judicial Branch. The precise role that the judicial branch of the federal government should play with respect to the other two branches, though briefly sketched in about one page (375 words) in the Constitution’s Article III (see above, Module 8, ch. 3), has been a subject of constant debate ever since the Philadelphia Convention of 1787.

An Independent Federal Judiciary. Most of the founders seem to have assumed that an independent judiciary was essential to the separation of powers that the Constitution established. The most prominent and detailed defenses of judicial independence were written by Alexander Hamilton, who devoted several of his essays in the Federalist to this topic, notably Federalist no. 78, which focuses in particular on the lifetime appointments of judges (see below). As we have seen, however, many Antifederalists thought that the federal judiciary was overly powerful and would encroach on the states’ jurisdiction.

The Judiciary Act of Sept., 1789, filled in many of the details of how the federal judiciary would operate and described the scope of federal jurisdiction (see below).