Order of the Courts

Alexander Hamilton famously claimed that "the judiciary is beyond comparison the weakest of the three departments of power" in the U.S. government. Congress holds the purse strings. The president holds the sword. The courts have only their judgments.

Yet those judgments have proven strong enough to bend Congress's will and check presidential power many times in the 200 years since Hamilton wrote. Clearly, the judiciary isn't so weak after all. So let's consider the order of America's federal courts, by the numbers.

Read it online
Get it as an easy-print PDF

Starting the Supreme Court

At first, Hamilton seemed right in calling the federal judiciary weak. Go back far enough in American history, and it looked more like a twig of government than a good-sized branch. Here's how the Supreme Court got its shaky start.

Read it online
Get it as an easy-print PDF

The Supremest Supreme

In fact, the Supreme Court wouldn't sit at the top of American law if not for the work of its fourth chief justice, John Marshall. Marshall actually claimed more power for the Court than some of the founders wanted. In a landmark case, he claimed it had the power of "judicial review."

Read it online
Get it as an easy-print PDF

Getting Judicial Review

You may know that, in 1803, Marbury v. Madison established the Supreme Court's right to rule on constitutional questions. But what really happened? It started when William Marbury sued James Madison for a job--and ended when John Marshall made the Supreme Court a lot more supreme.

Read it online
Get it as an easy-print PDF

How to Get a Supreme Court Hearing

For more than two centuries, the Supreme Court has been ruling on the nation's most important legal cases. But what sorts of cases does the Supreme Court actually hear? To find out, suppose you're an insatiably litigious U.S. citizen, and you're just dying to take a case as far as it can possibly go. What should you do?

Read it online
Get it as an easy-print PDF

9 Justices vs. 7 Dwarfs

Sleepy, Dopey, Happy, Grumpy, Sneezy, Bashful, and Doc may not wield the judicial power of the United States, but they're still better known than the Supreme Court justices. While 77 percent of Americans can name two of Snow White's seven dwarfs, only 24 percent can name two of the nine men and women on the Court. Can you name all nine?

Read it online
Get it as an easy-print PDF

--Michael Himick and Steve Sampson