court A court is an institution, often a government entity, with the authority to adjudicate legal disputes between Party (law), parties and Administration of justice, administer justice in Civil law (common law), civil, Criminal law, criminal, an ...

of general jurisdiction, in the

law of the United States The law of the United States comprises many levels of Codification (law), codified and uncodified forms of law, of which the supreme law is the nation's Constitution of the United States, Constitution, which prescribes the foundation of the ...

, is a court with authority to hear cases in law and in equity of all kinds –

criminal In ordinary language, a crime is an unlawful act punishable by a State (polity), state or other authority. The term ''crime'' does not, in modern criminal law, have any simple and universally accepted definition,Farmer, Lindsay: "Crime, definiti ...

, civil,

family Family (from ) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). It forms the basis for social order. Ideally, families offer predictabili ...

probate In common law jurisdictions, probate is the judicial process whereby a will is "proved" in a court of law and accepted as a valid public document that is the true last testament of the deceased; or whereby, in the absence of a legal will, the e ...

, and other legal claims.

State courts of general jurisdiction

U.S. states often provide their

state State most commonly refers to: * State (polity), a centralized political organization that regulates law and society within a territory **Sovereign state, a sovereign polity in international law, commonly referred to as a country **Nation state, a ...

trial courts with general jurisdiction. The

Legal Information Institute The Legal Information Institute (LII) is a non-profit public service of Cornell Law School that provides no-cost access to current American and international legal research sources online. Founded in 1992 by Peter Martin and Tom Bruce, LII ...

notes that "often, states will vest their trial courts with general jurisdiction" – with the ability to hear state and federal matters in law and in equity, although these courts may also organize themselves into divisions or departments to handle particular matters (eg., by assigning a judge of the court of general jurisdiction to hear that court's criminal matters, or probate, or family law).

Federal courts of limited jurisdiction

All

United States federal courts The federal judiciary of the United States is one of the three branches of the federal government of the United States organized under the Constitution of the United States, United States Constitution and Law of the United States, laws of the fed ...

are courts of

limited jurisdiction Limited jurisdiction, or special jurisdiction, is the court's jurisdiction only on certain types of cases such as bankruptcy, and family matters. Courts of limited jurisdiction, as opposed to general jurisdiction, derive power from an issuing auth ...

, limited by constitution and statute, and to the extent that they can not hear many kinds of claims brought under state law, but

United States district court The United States district courts are the trial courts of the United States federal judiciary, U.S. federal judiciary. There is one district court for each United States federal judicial district, federal judicial district. Each district cov ...

s have been described as "the courts of general jurisdiction in the federal court system" (as they can generally provide redress in both law and equity, as well as hearing both civil and criminal cases).

Bankruptcy Bankruptcy is a legal process through which people or other entities who cannot repay debts to creditors may seek relief from some or all of their debts. In most jurisdictions, bankruptcy is imposed by a court order, often initiated by the deb ...

is dealt with as a separate part of the federal district court, though they are viewed as the same unit, and decisions of the bankruptcy court are generally appealable to the district court. This is a result of being created under different articles of the

Constitution A constitution is the aggregate of fundamental principles or established precedents that constitute the legal basis of a polity, organization or other type of entity, and commonly determines how that entity is to be governed. When these pri ...

, bankruptcy law was established in a separate article from the article that established the federal judiciary.

General jurisdiction and bringing defendants into the forum

General jurisdiction often provides courts with the widest possible ability to take jurisdiction over defendants (particularly corporations), even when contact with the forum is minimal.

General jurisdiction and judicial immunity

One significant effect of the classification of a court is the civil or criminal liability that a

judge A judge is a person who wiktionary:preside, presides over court proceedings, either alone or as a part of a judicial panel. In an adversarial system, the judge hears all the witnesses and any other Evidence (law), evidence presented by the barris ...

from that court might face for stepping beyond the bounds of that court. Judges are able to claim judicial immunity for acts that are not completely beyond their jurisdiction. For example, if a probate judge of limited jurisdiction were to sentence a person to jail, that judge would not have immunity and could be sued because the probate judge has no jurisdiction to effect a criminal sentence. However, a judge in a court of general jurisdiction who happened to be assigned to a probate case ''would'' be immune from suit for sending a party to jail, because handing down a criminal sentence is not completely beyond the jurisdiction of such a judge. In the United States, this principle was established by the

Supreme Court In most legal jurisdictions, a supreme court, also known as a court of last resort, apex court, high (or final) court of appeal, and court of final appeal, is the highest court within the hierarchy of courts. Broadly speaking, the decisions of ...

in '' Stump v. Sparkman''. 435 U.S. 349 (1978). The Court found in that case that an

Indiana Indiana ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. It borders Lake Michigan to the northwest, Michigan to the north and northeast, Ohio to the east, the Ohio River and Kentucky to the s ...

judge was immune from a suit brought by a young woman whom the judge had ordered to be sterilized, at the behest of the woman's mother. Because the Indiana court was a court of general jurisdiction, and no law of Indiana expressly prohibited the judge from issuing such an order, the Supreme Court found that the order was not completely beyond the jurisdiction of that judge, and therefore the order was subject to judicial immunity.

References

{{reflist Jurisdiction

State courts of general jurisdiction

Federal courts of limited jurisdiction

General jurisdiction and bringing defendants into the forum

General jurisdiction and judicial immunity

See also

References