Subject Matter Jurisdiction Essay

Jurisdiction can be used in many different ways, depending on the circumstances. It can be most basically defined as the official power to make legal decisions and judgments. Federal and state laws can limit and grant the courts jurisdiction. In order for a court's decision to be a legally valid one, it must have two types of jurisdiction: personal jurisdiction and subject matter jurisdiction. Personal jurisdiction rules determine whether a court has power over a particular defendant, you can't just sue someone in your home state if the defendant doesn't live in your state, has never been in your state, and doesn't do business in your state. Where subject matter jurisdiction is the authority of a court to hear cases of a particular type or cases relating to a
An example of concurrent jurisdiction could be if someone robs a federally owned bank they can be tried in both state and federal court. Though this type of jurisdiction can lead to forum shopping where the plaintiff can chose the court that would create a verdict more so in their favor. Another type of jurisdiction that involves chooses different courts to fit your case type would be jurisdictional amount. This is a term used to describe the amount of money at stake in a lawsuit, as a requirement that a person must be seeking a certain amount of money in order to bring his or her case to a certain court. For example a small claims court is set to specifically hear cases where the money at stake is small or under a certain amount of money. If the amount of money someone is asking for is over that amount, small claims no longer has jurisdiction over that particular case. Long arm jurisdiction law which gives a local state court jurisdiction over an out-of-state company or individual whose actions caused damage locally or to a local