What law created the federal court system of the United States in 1789?

The Judiciary Act of 1789 created the federal court system of the United States.

Congress passed the law on September 24, 1789, during the first session of the new government under the Constitution. The Constitution established a Supreme Court but left much of the federal judiciary’s structure to Congress. The act supplied that structure by creating district courts and circuit courts and defining their jurisdiction.

It provided for a Supreme Court with a chief justice and five associate justices. The law also created the office of attorney general and established the position of United States marshal in each federal district. President George Washington signed the measure into law.

The act’s original structure changed repeatedly as the country expanded and Congress revised the courts. It is sometimes confused with the Judiciary Act of 1801, a later law passed near the end of John Adams’s presidency. The 1789 act was the foundational statute that made the Constitution’s judicial branch operational.