United States courts of appeals: Difference between revisions

{{short description|Post-1891 U.S. appellate circuit courts}}

[[File:US Court of Appeals and District Court map.svg|thumb|upright=1.75|right|Map of the geographic boundaries of the various United States courts of appeals (numbered and colored) and United States district courts (marked by state boundaries or dotted lines)]]

The '''United States courts of appeals''' are the intermediate [[appellate court]]s of the [[United States federal judiciary]]. They hear appeals of cases from the [[United States district court]]s and some [[List of federal agencies in the United States|U.S. administrative agencies]], and their decisions can be appealed to the [[Supreme Court of the United States]]. The courts of appeals are divided into 13 "Circuits".<ref name="statute">The assignment of judicial circuits is defined by {{USC|28|41}}, along with {{USC|48|1821}} which specifies that the [[District Court for the Northern Mariana Islands|Northern Mariana Islands]] falls within the same judicial circuit as [[District_Court_of_Guam|Guam]].</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Brian Duignan, Gloria Lotha |date=1998-07-20 |title=United States Court of Appeals |url=https://www.britannica.com/topic/United-States-Court-of-Appeals |access-date=2024-02-10 |website=[[Encyclopædia Britannica]]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=[[United States Department of Justice|U.S. Department of Justice]] |title=Introduction To The Federal Court System |url=https://www.justice.gov/usao/justice-101/federal-courts |website=Executive Office for United States Attorneys}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=Court Role and Structure |url=https://www.uscourts.gov/about-federal-courts/court-role-and-structure |website=[[Administrative Office of the United States Courts|Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts]] on behalf of the [[Federal judiciary of the United States|Federal Judiciary]]}}</ref> Eleven of the circuits are numbered "First" through "Eleventh" and cover geographic areas of the United States and hear [[appeal]]s from the [[United States district court|U.S. district court]]s within their borders. The [[United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit|District of Columbia Circuit]] covers only [[Washington, D.C.|Washington, DC]]. The [[United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit|Federal Circuit]] hears appeals from federal courts across the entire United States in cases involving certain specialized areas of law.