BREAKING : Congress Looks to Split up 9th Circuit Court of Appeals
The 9th Circuit, or “9th Circus” as it’s better known, is the most liberal court in the land, and it may be heading for a SPLIT soon if Congress has their way.
On Thursday morning the House held a hearing on the possibility of splitting up the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
You’ll recall, the 9th Circuit is one of President Trump’s least favorite courts and the first to cause partisan havoc on his original travel ban.
From Daily Caller
Three 9th Circuit judges, including Chief Judge Sidney Thomas, Judge Alex Kozinski, and Judge Carlos Bea gave testimony before House Committee on the Judiciary Subcommittee on Courts, Intellectual Property and the Internet. All three judges, like most of their 9th Circuit colleagues, support the current configuration and oppose splitting the court.
The subcommittee’s chairman, Republican Rep. Darrell Issa, said the court has become too unwieldy to operate efficiently. At 12,000 cases, the court hears twice as many appeals as the next largest circuit court per year. The court also has the largest geographic jurisdiction in the country, running as far north as the Arctic Circle and as far south as Arizona’s Grand Canyon. Fully one-fifth of the country’s population sits in the 9th Circuit. As such, the court’s massive docket generates lengthy turnaround times in decisions and can make access to the courts challenging for average citizens.
The sprawling 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals was split into two appeals courts in 1981 over similar concerns. Alabama, Georgia, and Florida were removed from the 5th Circuit and reestablished as the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Issa pointed out that the legislation was adopted quickly in both houses of Congress with unanimous consent.
Democrats on the subcommittee argued that the administrative and logistical concerns Republican lawmakers raised were little more than a thin veneer masking their ideological hostility to the court.
“Like clockwork we see proposals to split the 9th Circuit whenever it hands down decisions with which conservatives disagree,” said Democratic Rep. Jerry Nadler.
“The 9th Circuit has long been in the sights of Republican politicians,” he added.
Democratic Rep. John Conyers of Michigan was more circumspect.
“I will not speculate why there has been such an interest among my conservative colleagues about splitting the 9th Circuit,” he said.
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Regardless of their decisions, that court is simply to big and therefore harms all those that live in it from getting as fair an appeals process as those residing in different jurisdictions. Getting rid of the most overturned court or at least splitting it up is nice icing on the cake!
It needs to be split into two : california, hawaii alaska and guam remain in 9th and new circuit located in phoenix covers everyone else in the 9th. Its very prestigious for a city to have an appeals court so the two arizona senators would fight hard for this
Quit talking about it, and get it done!! It’s a rogue activist group, and needs to be shut down!
The ninth circuit court will be restructured to limit it’s scope of influence. There may be another court started as well. It is overdue and only the Democrats are against this.