The Texas Court System

Compared to the United States’ 4,543 worded constitution, Texas’ constitution has nearly twenty times more words (87,000) (Collier). The national constitution has never been replaced; however, it has been amended twenty-seven times. Texas’s constitution has been replaced a total number of 5 times due to how detailed it is. Depending on the era, a constitution may have certain rules which as time progresses become more hurtful to its constituents. Only a century ago, women and people of color had little to no rights as a human being. It took America, “Land of the free”, a little more than a century to allow women to vote. It is obvious that the ability to amend a constitution is a valuable one. The issue in Texas is that it has had a unique history and vast spread of land; therefore, it’s constitution is quite detailed. Texas was once its own republic, it was one of the later states to be admitted to the United States, and that it occupies so much land that counties within its lines often differ drastically.

The Texas judicial system has been called one of the most complex in the United States, if not the world. It features five layers of courts, several instances of overlapping jurisdiction, and a bifurcated appellate system at the top level. The structure of the system is laid out in Article 5 of the Texas Constitution.

The legal framework of a government, which establishes its power and authority as well as the limits on that power is known as Constitution. The Texas Constitution is a legal structure within which government works in Texas as the US Constitution is the legal structure for our national government. Reasonably, even more than US Constitution, the Texas Constitution has an immediate and vast impact on the everyday lives of Texans. The final constitution of Texas was written in 1876 and, in 1875 a constitutional convention was called. The current constitution of the Texas is among the longest of the state constitution in the United States. The Texas constitution performs many important tasks. Although there are rights guaranteed to Texan in Texas constitution that go far beyond those of US constitution addressing issues related to Texans privates lives, there are some weakness that I would like to change if I were given the task of rewrite the Texas Constitution.

This paper will discuss about the three branches of government of Texas. The government of Texas has its operations under the constitution of Texas (Maxwell, Crain, & Santos, 2013). It consists of a unitary democratic state of government that applies the Dillon Rule as the County and municipal levels. The branches of the Texas government consist of the executive branch, which consist of the governor, Lieutenant governor and many others in that docket.

There are courts leading to the highest (Supreme Court) so that way every case is heard fairly. With Texas following the US Supreme Court is a good structure for not only the government but for citizens as well. Not only does the government get to divide all they cases between courts and importance but the people also get a right to ask to go higher, from state Supreme Court to federal Supreme Court. The people also have a choice to appeal, with Courts of Appeal. The way the court systems are set up throughout both the federal and state systems are confusing but it is a better system. If the state or nation only had a single court everything would be corrupt and out of order. We would only have one court system dealing with murder, marriage, bankruptcy, and international trade that would confuse everyone. Also with mixing all kinds of criminals together can possible get to the judge, when hearing different kinds of casing back to back can interfere with the verdict. When hearing murder case than hearing a small robbery can right after, the judge can easily be more lenient with the robbery case because it isn’t as big as a crime as murder. I believe the way the Texas Supreme Court it set up is a good

“The Texas Legislature is the most important representative institution in the state” (TEXT 201). The Texas legislature performs a great number of functions, but one of the main functions is lawmaking. Hundreds of bills are drafted but it is not easy for that bill to become law. Roughly every two years, the legislature gathers to carry out laws about issues of allocating resources, benefits, costs, and the behavior of state residents. Policies and proposals for constitutional amendments are looked at ranging from small local issues to statewide issues. The state legislature also plays a significant role in state finances through its power to tax. It has the power to decide if tax increases or decrease are necessary, budgeting for and financing

Court cases, both criminal and civil begin in a regional court which makes a decision based upon the law that governs that particular region and that specific

All of the state judges are bound by the U.S. Constitution, which makes the Texas Constitution weaker than the U.S. Constitution. The U.S. Constitution includes the supremacy clause, which states that it is the law of the land. It says that if for some reason there is a conflict between the two constitutions, the U.S. Constitution will overrule Texas’. The most recent ruling on same sex marriage revealed this power. Some states had laws preventing same sex marriage, but once the Supreme Court ruled it constitutional, the laws were no longer valid and they must recognize same sex

The textbook explains that courts of limited jurisdiction vary extensively. These specific courts hear cases involving minor offenses such as traffic disputes, collisions, and other civil matters. Additionally, courts of limited jurisdiction take up more than 80% of all of California’s courts. These courts also have the greatest caseloads in the entire nation. The District of Columbia, Iowa, South Dakota, Idaho and Illinois are the only states that lack courts with limited jurisdiction. Courts of limited jurisdiction are also known as municipal courts, county courts, or justice of the peace courts. These courts remain extremely full with heavy caseloads due to the fact that they hear many different types of cases.

Many cases are heard only in front of a judge, and other cases are tried, and have a

The State Courts System, on the other hand, are extremely diverse. None of the states provide similar judicial practices. State Courts include inferior courts which are further classified as magistrate courts, municipal courts, county courts and many others. There are also some superior courts at the state levels known as circuit or district courts (James, 2009).

Many states also have specialized trial courts that hear cases related to a very specific area of the law. These courts can include probate courts, family law courts, juvenile courts,

The legal system is made up of civil courts, criminal courts and specialty courts such as family law courts and bankruptcy court. Each court has its own jurisdiction, which refers to the cases that the court is allowed to hear. In some instances, a case can only be heard in one type of court. For example, a bankruptcy case must be heard in a bankruptcy court. In other instances, there may be several potential courts with jurisdiction. For example, a federal criminal court and a state criminal court would each have jurisdiction over a crime that is a federal drug offense but that is also an offense on the state level.

This chapter opens by discussing in detail the many different forms of the American Court system and how they all work both individually on their own as well as an overall system, as seen in the difference between federal and state court systems that work both individually on their own separate systems and procedures. The beginning of this chapter also discusses how the federal court systems are divided by different types of courts (i.e. intermediate appellate courts, trial courts of general jurisdiction etc.)

The legal system of the United States also has different types of courts in addition to different types and classifications of