Hart and Wechsler's The Federal Courts and the Federal System

University Casebook

by Richard H. Fallon Jr., John F. Manning, Daniel J. Meltzer

The Sixth Edition of this classic casebook on The Federal Courts and the Federal System retains its traditional intellectual rigor, but has been thoroughly revised to improve its teachability and to incorporate important new material on many topics, including limits on the powers of Congress to restrict federal detainees' rights of access to the federal courts, and the impact of international law and international tribunals on domestic law. Hart & Wechsler's casebook on The Federal Courts and the Federal System, when first published in 1953, contributed substantially to the creation of a new field of legal scholarship - one that may be broadly defined as the role of the federal courts in the constitutional plan and the relationships among that system of courts, the other branches of the federal government, and the institutions of state and local government. From its inception to the present day, the book has continued to be the leading casebook in its field - one that includes not only a broad range of primary and secondary material but also extensive textual notes that provide historical background for discussion and that challenge the student to think through the difficult problems that pervade the subject. In the new edition, the coverage continues to be more comprehensive than that of any other casebook in the field, but at the same time the authors have in many ways made the book more teachable than ever before and more accessible to students. As part of this effort, unnecessary detail has been deleted, materials of primary interest for purposes of further research have been moved to footnotes, and the use of questions has been more rigorously confined.

Genres: Law, Textbooks

1514 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2012

About the author

Richard Henry Fallon Jr. was an American legal scholar and the Joseph Story Professor of Law at Harvard Law School. Born in Maine and a two-time graduate of Yale, Fallon became a prolific scholar of constitutional law and federal courts, teaching and writing on those subjects at Harvard from 1982 until he died in 2025.

Reviews

[P J M]

I will rightly be mocked for logging this, but still: we’ve earned the log.

[Meredith Holley · Rating 3 out of 5]

This term, I was the tutor for the dreamy constitutional law professor. He’s one of those people where you don’t necessarily realize how dreamy he is at first, and then later, when he’s saying something ridiculous about INS v. Chadha, you get a little weak kneed and nervous, even though you totally disagree. You know what I mean. Anyway, in our first meeting this year about the tutoring, he asked me about my classes. I told him I was taking a federal courts class (or “fed jur” to those in the know), and he asked me if we were reading the Heart & Wechslers, which he explained has tormented law students for eons. He said to skip this book and read Chemerinsky's Federal Jurisdiction instead. I went through them both, and while the Chemerinsky is definitely helpful, as always, I still appreciated having the actual cases available.

It’s true, there is a lot of torment in this book, but I have to say I basically like it, if only from association with this super-amazing class. It’s really the only class I’ve taken, where everyone I’ve ever talked to who has taken the class has said they like it. BECAUSE IT’S SO STUPENDOUS. Oh, except I'm seeing now, below, that Lightreads did not love it. :( Well, I totally loved this class. We had this spectacular professor, who is something of an expert about Don’t Ask Don’t Tell, and she explained everything in a way where I'm convinced she is pretty genius and I know she is a great teacher.

My random thoughts about the topic:

1. The Judiciary Act of 1789 basically sucks. Why write something in 500 words that you could write in 10? It’s ridiculous jargon. But, Chief Justice John Marshall is the man. I know he was kind of sneaky, but I’ll fight anyone who says he didn’t save the union for the years he was Chief Justice. He rules.

2. Don’t Ask Don’t Tell is in an interesting place right now. The Ninth Circuit has ruled that any time the military fires someone under the policy, it has to show that the person’s actions were actually undermining the military. The First Circuit has said that it doesn’t have to show that. This creates a real implementation problem for the military. When different circuits interpret laws differently, sometimes it works out okay for the executive branch. Like, with the EPA, different interpretations of forestry laws, for example, don’t create a big problem because forests stay in the same place. With DADT, it’s different because military personnel move around a lot. So, say someone is gay in the Ninth Circuit, and their gayness isn’t actually undermining the military, their partner could potentially receive benefits of a domestic partnership. But, what if that person travels between bases in the First and Ninth Circuit? The easy answer would seem to be to stop firing people in both circuits, but that is not the road the military has chosen so far.

3. Indian law. Man, tribes, I really think you guys should sign onto the Constitution. This is outrageous, and I don’t think the sacrifices you make are worth the benefits of not signing having the requirements of the Constitution.

4. International law. This is what my final paper was about. I think we’re coming to a place where the structure of international law and its application to local administration of justice is going to require a more organized and binding form of international government. I wonder if this will happen, and, if so, whether it will look like what we have now and just have more authority, or if it will require an entire restructuring of the UN.

That’s a brief summary of my thoughts on this book. The book itself is . . . not totally clear, but the class is amazing. Learning law is funny because the topics with interesting fact patterns tend to have boring legal questions, while the topics with boring fact patterns have fascinating legal questions. This topic is definitely the latter. They say it’s civ pro on crack. That’s pretty true. It’s like the crack baby of civ pro and con law. Total favorite for me. I don’t know what I’m going to do next year without constitution classes. Outlook is bleak.

[sara]

the real federal courts were the friends we met along the way <3 [thank you to this book for contributing nothing to my reading goal in proportion to the pain it caused me]

[Priya · Rating 3 out of 5]

felt like i was having a stroke while reading this


case notes were incoherent / sucked -- i hated how they kept name dropping random professors by last name (eg. "see what my buddy Prof. Smith wrote in Harv. L. Rev." like that's fine but idk who that is and also i don't rlly care).

i liked....i liked the cases tho. i thought they were interesting. sorry to my fans!

[Nathan Akers]

This is a hard earned log

[Clay Ward · Rating 1 out of 5]

This shit was ass and I barely even read it. Fuck u Pullman doctrine

[Paul · Rating 5 out of 5]

My favorite law casebook ever. The material is HARD (think of it as the bastard child of constitutional law and civil procedure), but very interesting. Subject matter jurisdiction, Article I and III courts, federal review of state decisions, military tribunals, federal questions, McCardle problems, 1983 actions, implied remedies/causes of action are all covered in an effective manner. The post-case notes are among the most thought provoking I've ever seen in a casebook.

[Aubra · Rating 2 out of 5]

apparently it's a famous, authoritative text. but either it is really unclearly written, or else i'm mentally slow. regardless, it's good timing as far as having to read it - coincides with my little struggles to come to terms with the role of the judicial branch.

[Kelly Mai · Rating 5 out of 5]

marbury v. madison and ive alrdy had enough so i am logging it into the goodreads as READ. alrdy kno its gonna be a rough one. thank you.

update jan: a- in fed cts is tacky to say but will warrant 5 stars

[Sean Camoni · Rating 5 out of 5]

THE book on the subject.

[Elizabeth · Rating 2 out of 5]

Fed Cts, baby. Good times all around.