How State Courts Work, and Why Most Cases End Up There
Key takeaways
- State courts handle about 95 percent of all cases filed in the United States, tens of millions a year.
- Most states have trial courts of limited and general jurisdiction, an intermediate appeals court, and a supreme court.
- Family, traffic, probate, landlord-tenant, small claims, and most criminal cases are heard in state courts.
- About 38 states use elections of some kind to choose or retain judges on their highest court, and campaign spending has soared.
- State supreme courts have the final word on their state's constitution and laws, while the U.S. Supreme Court can review only federal questions.
- Small claims courts let people sue for modest amounts without a lawyer.
When most people go to court, for a speeding ticket, a divorce, an eviction, a will, or a crime, they go to a state court. Federal courts get more attention, but state courts decide the vast majority of legal disputes and interpret the state constitutions that protect many rights.
This guide explains how state courts are organized and how they differ from federal courts. Each state's system is a little different, and state court websites explain local procedures.
A state case can reach the U.S. Supreme Court only if it raises a federal question, such as a constitutional right, after the state's highest court rules. Federal courts can also review state convictions through habeas corpus petitions, though Congress limited them in 1996. Debates include judicial elections and campaign money, crowded dockets and court debt, access for people without lawyers, and the role of state courts in election disputes.
Most states use elections of some kind. About 38 states elect or hold retention votes for supreme court justices, through partisan, nonpartisan, or merit selection systems, and many states elect trial judges. The rest let governors or legislatures appoint. Spending on state supreme court races has soared, with the April 2025 Wisconsin race costing about 100 million dollars, the most in U.S. history.
Most cases start in trial courts. Courts of limited jurisdiction, such as municipal, traffic, magistrate, and small claims courts, handle minor matters quickly. Courts of general jurisdiction, often called district, superior, or circuit courts, hold jury trials in serious criminal and civil cases. Many states have specialized family, probate, juvenile, housing, and drug or veterans treatment courts.
Most criminal cases are brought by elected local prosecutors, usually called district attorneys or state attorneys, while state attorneys general handle appeals and some statewide matters. Defendants who cannot afford a lawyer have a right to one under Gideon v. Wainwright, provided through public defender offices or appointed lawyers, many of them heavily burdened. Most criminal cases end in plea bargains rather than trials.
Losing parties can usually appeal to an intermediate appellate court, which reviews legal errors rather than retrying facts, and then ask the state supreme court to hear the case. State supreme courts are the final authority on their state's constitution and laws, and many state constitutions protect rights more broadly than the U.S. Constitution, as some state courts have found for abortion, education funding, and voting.
The United States has two parallel court systems: federal courts, which hear cases under federal law, involving the U.S. government, or between parties from different states, and state courts, which hear nearly everything else. State courts handle about 95 percent of all cases, tens of millions a year, including most criminal prosecutions, contracts, injuries, family matters, and property disputes.
See the federal system in the federal courts map, state government in how state government works, or federal criminal cases in how a federal criminal case works.