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The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit is a federal court with appellate jurisdiction over the following United States district courts: It holds court in Seattle, Portland, San Francisco, and Pasadena (and occasionally Anchorage and Honolulu). Its headquarters are in San Francisco.
The Ninth Circuit is also by far the largest Circuit court in the US and it has the largest number of judges, with 28 positions currently authorized for the court (one of which is currently unfilled). Because of its large size, the court rarely sits for a full en banc court of all active judges. Instead, the court provides for a "limited en banc" review of a randomly-selected 11 judge panel. This means that en banc reviews may not actually reflect the views of the majority of the court, and indeed may not include any of the three judges involved in the decision being reviewed in the first place!
The court is considered by some to have an overly liberal bias, but arguably a majority of its judges are conservatives. While 17 judges have been appointed by Democratic presidents, 5 of those are solid conservatives. Thus only 12 of the Democrat_appointed judges are liberals or moderates, potentially leaving the remaining 15 as conservatives.
It is often called "the most overturned appeals court in the United States", but this is mostly a product of its high caseload. On a percentage basis, the circuit is not overturned much more than any other. (Indeed, in 2003 it had the least reversal rate of any appeals court with more than five cases reviewed.[1] (http://goldsteinhowe.com/blog/files/SemiFinalOT2003CircuitScorecard.pdf))
Because California lies within its territory, the court hears cases involving celebrities from time to time. In one well_known case involving Vanna White, Judge Alex Kozinski noted that "we are the Court of Appeals for the Hollywood Circuit."
In 2002, it made one of its most controversial decisions to date in the case of Newdow v. United States Congress. The court ruled that encouraging public school students to recite a pledge which includes the phrase "under God" (the Pledge of Allegiance) violated the First Amendment ban on establishment of religion. The decision was penned for the majority by Nixon appointee Alfred T. Goodwin, one of the senior status (semi-retired) judges on the court. The Supreme Court overturned this decision on June 14, 2004, because the plaintiff, Michael Newdow, lacked legal standing to bring suit. The Court did not address the constitutionality of the pledge.
The court is also on the leading edge of federalism, recently refusing to enforce federal laws against homemade pornography (US v. McCoy), homemade firearms (US v. Stewart), and homegrown marijuana (Raich v. Ashcroft). The court reasoned that application of such laws exceeded Congress's authority under the Commerce Clause, basing the decision on the Supreme Court case United States v. Lopez.
Judges
The judges on the court (as of December 8, 2004) are: - Chief Judge Mary M. Schroeder, Phoenix, Arizona
- Circuit Judge Harry Pregerson, Woodland Hills, California
- Circuit Judge Stephen Roy Reinhardt, Los Angeles, California
- Circuit Judge Alex Kozinski, Pasadena, California
- Circuit Judge Diarmuid Fionntain O'Scannlain, Portland, Oregon
- Circuit Judge Stephen S. Trott, Boise, Idaho
- Circuit Judge Pamela Ann Rymer, Pasadena, California
- Circuit Judge Andrew Jay Kleinfeld, Fairbanks, Alaska
- Circuit Judge Michael Daly Hawkins, Phoenix, Arizona
- Circuit Judge Sidney Runyan Thomas, Billings, Montana
- Circuit Judge Barry G. Silverman, Phoenix, Arizona
- Circuit Judge Susan P. Graber, Portland, Oregon
- Circuit Judge M. Margaret McKeown, Seattle, Washington
- Circuit Judge Kim McLane Wardlaw, Pasadena, California
- Circuit Judge William A. Fletcher, San Francisco, California
- Circuit Judge Raymond C. Fisher, Pasadena, California
- Circuit Judge Ronald Murray Gould, Seattle, Washington
- Circuit Judge Richard A. Paez, Los Angeles, California
- Circuit Judge Marsha S. Berzon, San Francisco, California
- Circuit Judge Richard C. Tallman
- Circuit Judge Johnnie B. Rawlinson, Las Vegas, Nevada
- Circuit Judge Richard R. Clifton
- Circuit Judge Jay S. Bybee
- Circuit Judge Consuelo Maria Callahan
- Circuit Judge Carlos T. Bea
- Senior Circuit Judge James Robert Browning, San Francisco, California
- Senior Circuit Judge Alfred Theodore Goodwin, Pasadena, California
- Senior Circuit Judge John Clifford Wallace, San Diego, California
- Senior Circuit Judge Joseph Tyree Sneed III, San Francisco, California
- Senior Circuit Judge Procter Ralph Hug, Jr., Reno, Nevada
- Senior Circuit Judge Otto Richard Skopil, Jr., Portland, Oregon
- Senior Circuit Judge Betty Binns Fletcher, Seattle, Washington
- Senior Circuit Judge Joseph Jerome Farris, Seattle, Washington
- Senior Circuit Judge Arthur Lawrence Alarcon, Los Angeles, California
- Senior Circuit Judge Warren John Ferguson, Santa Ana, California
- Senior Circuit Judge Dorothy Wright Nelson, Pasadena, California
- Senior Circuit Judge William Cameron Canby, Jr., Phoenix, Arizona
- Senior Circuit Judge Robert Boochever, Pasadena, California
- Senior Circuit Judge Robert R. Beezer, Seattle, Washington
- Senior Circuit Judge Cynthia Holcomb Hall, Pasadena, California
- Senior Circuit Judge Melvin T. Brunetti, Reno, Nevada
- Senior Circuit Judge John T. Noonan, Jr., San Francisco, California
- Senior Circuit Judge David R. Thompson, San Diego, California
- Senior Circuit Judge Edward Leavy, Portland, Oregon
- Senior Circuit Judge Ferdinand Francis Fernandez, Pasadena, California
- Senior Circuit Judge Thomas G. Nelson, Pasadena, California
- Senior Circuit Judge Atsushi Wallace Tashima, Pasadena, California
(Here circuit judges and senior circuit judges are listed in order of seniority.)
Three judgeships are vacant.
External links - United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit (http://www.ca9.uscourts.gov/)
- Recent opinions from FindLaw (http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?court=9th&navby=year&year=recent)
- Federal Judicial Center (http://www.fjc.gov/history/home.nsf/usca-09-frm?OpenFrameSet)
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