Chapter 13 Exercises — Lower Federal Courts

These exercises are designed to make you a lower-court-literate citizen. Most can be done in a sitting, with a laptop and access to public sources (uscourts.gov, courtlistener.com, the Federal Judicial Center, Pew Research, the Brookings Vacancies Tracker, and your circuit's own website). Pick the ones that match your interests and your instructor's emphasis.

Exercise 13.1 — Identify your federal district court and circuit

Goal: Learn the federal-judicial geography you actually live in.

  1. Go to uscourts.gov and use the "Court Locator" tool. Enter your home zip code.
  2. Identify (a) the federal judicial district you live in, (b) the division of that district (if applicable), (c) the federal court of appeals (circuit) that hears appeals from your district, (d) the city where the nearest district courthouse is located, and (e) the city where the circuit courthouse is located.
  3. Answer briefly: - How many active district judges are authorized for your district? - How many of them are vacancies as of today (use the Federal Judicial Vacancy List at uscourts.gov)? - How many active judges sit on your circuit, and what is the partisan-appointment breakdown (Democratic vs. Republican appointees)? You can find this at the circuit's website or at ballotpedia.org/Federal_courts.

Deliverable: A one-paragraph profile of "your" federal courts with the answers above.

Exercise 13.2 — Track a recent district-court decision in your circuit

Goal: Read actual lower-court reasoning, not media summaries of it.

  1. Go to courtlistener.com (free) or PACER (paid; sometimes free for educational use) and search for a recent (past twelve months) decision from a federal district court in your circuit. Pick one that interests you — civil rights, immigration, criminal sentencing, environmental, election administration, business regulation, intellectual property.
  2. Read the opinion. Most district-court rulings are between five and forty pages. Take notes on: - Who the parties are. - What relief the plaintiff sought. - What the judge ruled (granted, denied, granted in part). - The legal standard the judge applied. - One or two specific facts the judge found dispositive.
  3. Find the docket and identify (a) when the case was filed, (b) how many motions had been filed before this ruling, (c) whether the judge held an evidentiary hearing or ruled on the papers, and (d) whether the ruling has been appealed.

Deliverable: A one-page brief summary of the case (parties, claim, ruling, key facts, procedural posture). This is the kind of summary a journalist or a legal-analysis intern would write.

Exercise 13.3 — Compare Trump-1 and Biden federal judicial confirmation totals

Goal: Look at the empirical record of post-2013 confirmation politics, with both parties at the bench.

  1. Find official confirmation totals (the Federal Judicial Center's Biographical Directory, Senate.gov's nominations page, or Russell Wheeler's Brookings tracker are good sources): - Trump 1 (2017–2021): total Article III confirmations, broken down by Supreme Court / circuit / district. - Biden (2021–2025): same breakdown.
  2. Look up the partisan composition of the Senate during each presidency (Republican-controlled 2017–2019 and 2019–2021; Democratic-controlled 2021–2023; 50–50 with VP tiebreaker 2023–2025).
  3. Answer: - Did either president outpace the other on total confirmations? By how much? - On what dimensions did the cohorts differ (age at confirmation, demographic composition, professional background)? - How did the post-2013 simple-majority cloture rule (the "nuclear option") affect both presidents' ability to confirm? - What would have been likely under the pre-2013 rule? (Speculate, but ground the speculation in actual filibuster history.)
  4. Steel-man assignment. Write one paragraph defending the post-2013 simple-majority rule from a Democratic perspective. Write a second paragraph defending it from a Republican perspective. Then write a third paragraph criticizing it from either perspective.

Deliverable: A two-page memorandum titled "Post-Nuclear-Option Confirmation Politics: An Empirical Comparison."

Exercise 13.4 — Steel-man nationwide injunctions; steel-man the critique

Goal: Practice argumentative balance on a contested institutional question.

The chapter has argued that nationwide injunctions are doctrinally and politically contested, with bipartisan critics and bipartisan defenders. Your task is to argue both sides.

  1. Steel-man the practice. Write a 500-word essay defending nationwide injunctions as an appropriate tool of equity in cases of genuinely unlawful federal action. Use specific examples — at least one against a Trump-1 policy and at least one against a Biden policy. Cite Mila Sohoni's defense and any other defenders you can find.
  2. Steel-man the critique. Write a 500-word essay arguing that nationwide injunctions exceed the constitutional power of district courts and should be limited or abolished. Use specific examples on both sides of the political spectrum. Cite Sam Bray's critique, Howard Wasserman, Justice Gorsuch's separate opinions, and Justice Kagan's 2022 Northwestern speech.
  3. Reform proposals. Briefly describe (a) the Judicial Conference's March 2024 random-assignment guidance, (b) any congressional proposals to limit nationwide injunctions (such as the Stopping Activist Judges Act, the Nationwide Injunction Abuse Prevention Act, or any bipartisan compromise efforts), and (c) one proposal you would endorse, with a one-paragraph justification.

Deliverable: A balanced policy memo with the two essays and the reform proposal.

Exercise 13.5 — "Find the case"

Goal: Trace contemporary policy disputes back to the specific lower courts where they were decided.

For each of the following recent or ongoing federal-policy disputes, identify (a) the federal district court of origin, (b) the federal court of appeals on review, (c) whether the case has reached or will likely reach the Supreme Court, and (d) the name of the lead judge or panel. Use courtlistener.com, the federal-court websites, and reputable legal-news sources (SCOTUSblog, Law360, Reuters legal).

  1. Mifepristone access (2023–2024). Walk it from district through circuit through Supreme Court reversal in FDA v. Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine (2024).
  2. Federal student-loan forgiveness. Find the original Eastern District of Missouri ruling and trace it to the Supreme Court's Biden v. Nebraska (2023) decision.
  3. One Trump-2 executive-order challenge of your choice. Pick a current case (immigration, federal grants, agency restructuring, birthright citizenship, etc.) and identify the district court and the circuit.

Deliverable: A one-page table with three rows, one per case, and the four columns above filled in. Cite your sources.

Exercise 13.6 — The plea-bargain fact pattern

Goal: Confront the empirical reality of federal criminal practice.

  1. The chapter notes that roughly 95–97 percent of federal criminal convictions are by plea. Find the most recent annual report from the U.S. Sentencing Commission (ussc.gov) and verify the current percentage.
  2. Read briefly about the "trial penalty" — try the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers' 2018 report "The Trial Penalty: The Sixth Amendment Right to Trial on the Verge of Extinction and How to Save It" or Ben Trachtenberg's law-review work on the topic.
  3. Answer: - What is the magnitude of the trial penalty in federal cases (the empirical estimate)? - What are three structural drivers of the high plea rate? (Hint: charging discretion, mandatory minimums, acceptance-of-responsibility reductions under the Guidelines.) - What is the strongest argument for the current system from a prosecutor's perspective? - What is the strongest argument for reform from a defender's perspective?
  4. Discussion. If you served on a Sentencing Commission, would you propose reducing the trial penalty? If yes, how? If no, why not?

Deliverable: A 600-word response addressing the questions above.

Exercise 13.7 — Magistrate judges and the workload of federal courts

Goal: Understand the Article I judiciary that makes the system function.

  1. Find the Federal Magistrates Act of 1968 and the subsequent expansions in 1976 and 1979. Identify what new authority each expansion added.
  2. Look up the magistrate-judge complement in your federal district. (uscourts.gov has a roster.) How many full-time magistrates? How many part-time? What is the term length and the renewal mechanism?
  3. Read one recent ruling by a magistrate judge — discovery rulings are abundant on courtlistener.com. Note how the magistrate's order works alongside (or eventually subject to objection in front of) the assigned district judge.
  4. Reflect briefly: Article I judges are not life-tenured. They handle an enormous portion of the federal-court workload. What is the constitutional theory that makes this acceptable, and where are its limits? (Read the Stern v. Marshall (2011) summary in section 13.6 of the chapter as a starting point.)

Deliverable: A one-page summary of magistrate-judge workload and constitutional status, plus a brief reflection on the Stern v. Marshall doctrine.

Exercise 13.8 — Democracy Audit: identify litigation in your federal district affecting your area

Goal: Connect the abstract architecture to concrete politics in your community.

This exercise is the chapter's contribution to the Democracy Audit running project. You are tracking how federal courts shape political and civic life in your federal district.

  1. Identify a recent federal lawsuit, filed in your district within the past three years, that affects (a) state law in your state, (b) local government in your county or municipality, (c) a public institution (a school, a university, a hospital, a regulatory body), or (d) a major employer in your area.
  2. Track the case from filing through current status. Note the venue (which division), the assigned judge, the nature of the claim, the procedural posture, and any rulings to date.
  3. Identify any media coverage of the case in local outlets (your local newspaper, NPR affiliate, regional television). Compare the media coverage to the actual filings.
  4. Reflection question. What does this case tell you about who is using the federal courts to shape policy in your area? Is the litigation strategy partisan, advocacy-organization-driven, individual-plaintiff-driven, or some combination? Does the venue choice (within your district) appear strategic?

Deliverable: A two-page Democracy Audit entry titled "Federal Court Litigation in [Your District], 2023–2026."

Exercise 13.9 — Discussion / class debate prompt

Question: Should single-judge divisions be reformed?

Setup. Divide the class into two teams.

  • Team A: Argue that single-judge divisions like Amarillo, Wichita Falls, and Marshall should be reformed (random assignment across the entire district) because they enable forum shopping that undermines public confidence in judicial impartiality.
  • Team B: Argue that the existing assignment rules are constitutional, longstanding, and that critics' real objection is to the substantive rulings of particular judges, not to the structural design.

Rules. Each team must:

  1. Cite the Judicial Conference's March 2024 guidance and explain whether and why their position is consistent or inconsistent with it.
  2. Provide examples of forum-shopping by litigants on both sides of the political spectrum (the Northern District of California, the Northern District of Texas, the District of Hawaii, the Southern District of Florida).
  3. Steel-man the opposing position before refuting it.
  4. Avoid identifying any single judge by name as the villain or hero of the argument.

Outcome. Vote at the end. Write up your conclusions in 300 words.

Exercise 13.10 — Confirmation politics in your home-state senators' offices

Goal: Connect federal judicial confirmation politics to your own representation.

  1. Identify your two home-state senators. Look up their voting records on federal judicial confirmations during the most recent presidential administrations (Trump 1, Biden, Trump 2). Reliable sources: GovTrack, the Senate's official roll-call vote records (senate.gov), and the Brookings Wheeler tracker.
  2. For each senator, identify (a) the percentage of nominees they voted to confirm under each administration, (b) any high-profile nominations they publicly supported or opposed, and (c) any votes they cast against nominees of their own party's president.
  3. If your state's senators have used the blue slip mechanism on district-court nominations from your state, identify when and how. (The Senate Judiciary Committee's records and reporting in legal publications like Above the Law and Law360 can help you.)
  4. Reflection. Do your senators' confirmation voting patterns look principled, partisan, or strategic? Steel-man each interpretation. What would you ask them about their approach to judicial confirmation if you had a chance to meet with their staff?

Deliverable: A one-page profile of your two senators' confirmation voting records and a 200-word reflection.

Exercise 13.11 — The Federal Judicial Vacancy List

Goal: Read the federal-judiciary's own institutional accounting.

  1. Go to uscourts.gov and find the Federal Judicial Vacancy List. Look at current vacancies and "future vacancies" (judges who have announced senior status or retirement but whose seats are not yet open).
  2. Identify (a) the total number of current vacancies in district courts and circuit courts; (b) any vacancies in your circuit; (c) any "judicial emergencies" — designated vacancies in districts with sustained high caseloads. The Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts uses specific weighted-filings thresholds to declare a judicial emergency.
  3. Compare to the same list one year ago. (The Internet Archive's Wayback Machine at web.archive.org has snapshots.) Has the vacancy count grown, shrunk, or stayed the same? What does the trend suggest about confirmation politics under the current administration?

Deliverable: A short table summarizing the data and a one-paragraph interpretation.