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What Is a Court?

People, businesses, and the government have disputes.

Courts are institutions created by a government to settle disputes through a legal process.

    
    Georgia Farmer sold Florida Grocer $100,000 worth of peaches.

     Florida Grocer failed to pay for the peaches, saying they were spoiled.

     The court will decide if the peaches were spoiled or whether Florida Grocer
     owes Georgia Farmer for the delivery.

     The government accuses someone of a crime. Courts decide whether
     the person committed the crime, and, if so, what the punishment
     should be.

Did Frank Clark rob the bank, or was it someone else?

If it was Frank Clark, how should he be punished?

Court decisions affect other people, in addition to the parties involved in the lawsuit.

Armbands against the Vietnam War

A desegregated classroom, circa 1954

The court said the nation must desegregate the public schools. The United States Supreme Court’s 1954 decision in Brown v. Board of Education had an even bigger effect. In that case, the court decided that requiring white children and African-American children to go to separate schools violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution.