The Supreme Federal Court ( pt, Supremo Tribunal Federal, , abbreviated STF) is the
supreme court
A supreme court is the highest court within the hierarchy of courts in most legal jurisdictions. Other descriptions for such courts include court of last resort, apex court, and high (or final) court of appeal. Broadly speaking, the decisions of ...
(court of last resort) of
Brazil
Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...
, serving primarily as the
Constitutional Court
A constitutional court is a high court that deals primarily with constitutional law. Its main authority is to rule on whether laws that are challenged are in fact unconstitutional, i.e. whether they conflict with constitutionally established ...
of the country. It is the highest
court of law
A court is any person or institution, often as a government institution, with the authority to adjudicate legal disputes between parties and carry out the administration of justice in civil, criminal, and administrative matters in accordanc ...
in Brazil for constitutional issues and its rulings cannot be appealed. On cases involving exclusively non-constitutional issues, regarding federal laws, the highest court is, by rule, the
Superior Court of Justice.
History
![A Justiça escultura BSB 08 2005 24v](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/93/A_Justi%C3%A7a_escultura_BSB_08_2005_24v.jpg)
The court was inaugurated during the
colonial era in 1808, the year that the
royal family
A royal family is the immediate family of kings/queens, emirs/emiras, sultans/ sultanas, or raja/ rani and sometimes their extended family. The term imperial family appropriately describes the family of an emperor or empress, and the term ...
of
Portugal
Portugal, officially the Portuguese Republic ( pt, República Portuguesa, links=yes ), is a country whose mainland is located on the Iberian Peninsula of Southwestern Europe, and whose territory also includes the Atlantic archipelagos of ...
(the
House of Braganza
The Most Serene House of Braganza ( pt, Sereníssima Casa de Bragança), also known as the Brigantine Dynasty (''Dinastia Brigantina''), is a dynasty of emperors, kings, princes, and dukes of Portuguese origin which reigned in Europe and the Ame ...
) arrived in
Rio de Janeiro
Rio de Janeiro ( , , ; literally 'River of January'), or simply Rio, is the capital of the state of the same name, Brazil's third-most populous state, and the second-most populous city in Brazil, after São Paulo. Listed by the GaWC as a b ...
. It was originally called the House of Appeals of Brazil ().
The proclamation of the
Brazilian Declaration of Independence
The Independence of Brazil comprised a series of political and military events that led to the independence of the Kingdom of Brazil from the United Kingdom of Portugal, Brazil and the Algarves as the Brazilian Empire. Most of the events occurre ...
and the adoption of the
Imperial Constitution in 1824 preceded the establishment of the Supreme Court of Justice () in 1829. With the first
Constitution of the Republic, the current Court was established.
Although the constitutional norms that regulated the creation of the Court allowed
Deodoro da Fonseca
Manuel Deodoro da Fonseca (; 5 August 1827 – 23 August 1892) was a Brazilian politician and military officer who served as the first president of Brazil. He was born in Alagoas in a military family, followed a military career, and became a n ...
, Brazil's first president, to nominate an entirely new Court, the president chose to nominate as the first members of the Supreme Federal Court the ministers who were then serving as members of the predecessor imperial Court.
Two hundred members have served on the Court. The
Constitution of 1891 decided that the Court would have 15 members. When
Getúlio Vargas
Getúlio Dornelles Vargas (; 19 April 1882 – 24 August 1954) was a Brazilian lawyer and politician who served as the 14th and 17th president of Brazil, from 1930 to 1945 and from 1951 to 1954. Due to his long and controversial tenure as Brazi ...
came into power, the number of members was reduced to 11. The number was changed to 16 in 1965, but returned to 11 in 1969 and has not changed since. Of all Presidents of Brazil, only one (
Café Filho
João Fernandes Campos Café Filho (; 3 February 1899 – 20 February 1970) was a Brazilian politician who served as the 18th president of Brazil, taking office upon the suicide of president Getúlio Vargas. He was the first Protestant to occupy ...
) never nominated a minister.
All judicial and administrative meetings of the Supreme Court have been broadcast live on
television
Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of television transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertisin ...
since 2002. The Court is open for the public to watch the meetings.
Functions
Alongside its appeal competence, mostly by the Extraordinary Appeal (), the Court has a small range of cases of
original jurisdiction
In common law legal systems original jurisdiction of a court is the power to hear a case for the first time, as opposed to appellate jurisdiction, when a higher court has the power to review a lower court's decision.
India
In India, the Sup ...
, including the power of
judicial review
Judicial review is a process under which executive, legislative and administrative actions are subject to review by the judiciary. A court with authority for judicial review may invalidate laws, acts and governmental actions that are incompat ...
, judging the
constitutionality
Constitutionality is said to be the condition of acting in accordance with an applicable constitution; "Webster On Line" the status of a law, a procedure, or an act's accordance with the laws or set forth in the applicable constitution. When l ...
of laws passed by the
National Congress, through a Direct Action of Unconstitutionality (, or ADI). There are also other mechanisms for reaching the Court directly, such as the Declaratory Action of Constitutionality (, or ADC) and the Direct Action of Unconstitutionality by Omission ( or ADO).
Case law
In May 2009 ''
The Economist
''The Economist'' is a British weekly newspaper printed in demitab format and published digitally. It focuses on current affairs, international business, politics, technology, and culture. Based in London, the newspaper is owned by The Econo ...
'' called the Supreme Federal Court "the most overburdened court in the world, thanks to a plethora of rights and privileges entrenched in the country's 1988 constitution (...) till recently the tribunal's decisions did not bind lower courts. The result was a court that is overstretched to the point of mutiny. The Supreme Court received 100,781 cases last year."
Overruling seems to be frequent in SFC jurisprudence: "three years ago when the STF adopted the understanding that defendants who have a conviction upheld by a single appellate court may be sent to jail to begin serving their sentences. (...) The 2016 decision happened largely due to a change in opinion from Justice
Gilmar Mendes
Gilmar Ferreira Mendes (born December 30, 1955) is a Brazilian Justice of the Supremo Tribunal Federal (Brazilian Supreme Federal Court), appointed by then President Fernando Henrique Cardoso in 2002. Mendes was also the Chief Justice for the 200 ...
(...). He had voted against sending defendants to jail after a single failed appeal in 2009, but changed his mind in 2016. Jump to 2019, and the circumstances – both political and judicial – have changed".
President and Vice-President of the Court
The President and Vice-president of the Court are elected by their peers for a term of two years by
secret ballot
The secret ballot, also known as the Australian ballot, is a voting method in which a voter's identity in an election or a referendum is anonymous. This forestalls attempts to influence the voter by intimidation, blackmailing, and potential vote ...
. The currently serving President is
Luiz Fux
Luiz Fux (; born 26 April 1953) is a Brazilian judge and the former Chief Justice of the Supreme Federal Court. He is of Romanian Jewish descent, and the first Jewish Brazilian member of the Court. He was previously a minister of the Superior ...
.
Re-election for a consecutive term is not allowed. By tradition, the members of the Court always elect as president the most senior minister of the Court that has not yet served as President, to avoid politicization of the Court.
If all members currently sitting on the Court have already served as president, the rotation starts all over again; however, due to the existence of a compulsory retirement age, and the consequent appointment of new ministers to fill those vacancies, it is very rare for the cycle to be completed and restarted, and some ministers are forced to retire before their turn in the presidency arrives, as was expected to happen with
Teori Zavascki.
According to the same convention, the Court selects as vice-president for a certain term the minister who, according to that tradition, will be selected president in the succeeding term. Also by tradition, the elections of the president and vice-president are never unanimous, there being always one isolated minority vote in each election, as the ministers who are to be elected never cast their votes for themselves; such votes are cast either for the Dean of the Court – its most senior member – or for some other elder minister that the one to be elected admires and wants to pay homage to.
The Chief Justice is also the 4th in the
Presidential Succession Line, when the
President of Brazil
The president of Brazil ( pt, Presidente do Brasil), officially the president of the Federative Republic of Brazil ( pt, Presidente da República Federativa do Brasil) or simply the ''President of the Republic'', is the head of state and head o ...
becomes prevented to be in charge, being preceded by the
Vice-President
A vice president, also director in British English, is an officer in government or business who is below the president (chief executive officer) in rank. It can also refer to executive vice presidents, signifying that the vice president is on t ...
, the President of the
Chamber of Deputies
The chamber of deputies is the lower house in many bicameral legislatures and the sole house in some unicameral legislatures.
Description
Historically, French Chamber of Deputies was the lower house of the French Parliament during the Bourbon R ...
, and the President of the
Federal Senate
A senate is a deliberative assembly, often the upper house or chamber of a bicameral legislature.
Senate or the Senate may also refer to:
* Any one of the national senates in the world, including
** The Brazilian Senate
** The United States Sen ...
, as provided in Article 80 of the
Brazilian Constitution
The Constitution of the Federative Republic of Brazil ( pt, Constituição da República Federativa do Brasil) is the supreme law of Brazil. It is the foundation and source of the legal authority underlying the existence of Brazil and the feder ...
.
[Brazilian Constitution](_blank)
''(in Portuguese)'' On June 25th 2020, Luiz Fux was elected as the next chief justice, to serve a two-year term that began on September 10.
Current members
The eleven
judge
A judge is a person who presides over court proceedings, either alone or as a part of a panel of judges. A judge hears all the witnesses and any other evidence presented by the barristers or solicitors of the case, assesses the credibility an ...
s of the court are called Ministers (), although having no similarity with the government body of
ministers. They are appointed by the
President
President most commonly refers to:
*President (corporate title)
*President (education), a leader of a college or university
*President (government title)
President may also refer to:
Automobiles
* Nissan President, a 1966–2010 Japanese ful ...
and approved by the
Senate
A senate is a deliberative assembly, often the upper house or chamber of a bicameral legislature. The name comes from the ancient Roman Senate (Latin: ''Senatus''), so-called as an assembly of the senior (Latin: ''senex'' meaning "the el ...
. There is no term length but a
mandatory retirement
Mandatory retirement also known as forced retirement, enforced retirement or compulsory retirement, is the set age at which people who hold certain jobs or offices are required by industry custom or by law to leave their employment, or retire.
As ...
age of 75.
; Notes
*
M. Names in bold are the names used in social denomination.
Gallery
File:STF of Brazil in 2006.jpg, Justices of the Supreme Court in 2006.
File:Brazilian Supreme Federal Tribunal.jpg, The Supreme Court in session.
File:STF Plenario.jpg, The courtroom of the Supreme Federal Court
File:Congresso_Nacional_(29532231602).jpg, Supreme Federal Court at night
File:Supreme Federal Court - Side.jpg, The Supreme Court lit up in pink for Breast Cancer Awareness Month
Breast Cancer Awareness Month (BCAM), also referred to in the United States as National Breast Cancer Awareness Month (NBCAM), is an annual international health campaign organized by major breast cancer charities every October to increase awaren ...
on October 29, 2020
See also
*
Brazil federal courts The federal court system of Brazil has all its organs and competences listed and defined in the Brazilian 1988 Constitution. The National Justice Council is an exclusively administrative organ of the federal court system.
Courts
*Supreme Federal Co ...
*
List of Ministers of the Supreme Federal Court (Brazil)
*
Tribunal de Justiça
A tribunal, generally, is any person or institution with authority to judge, adjudicate on, or determine claims or disputes—whether or not it is called a tribunal in its title.
For example, an advocate who appears before a court with a single ...
Notes
References
External links
Official website
*
Photo 360° of Supreme Federal Court - GUIABSB
{{authority control
Judiciary of Brazil
Brazil
Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...
Brazil
Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...
1808 establishments in Brazil
Courts and tribunals established in 1808