What is the “United States Department of Justice”?
A: The United States Department of Justice (DOJ), is a federal executive
department of the United States government.
What is its purpose?
A: It is tasked with the enforcement of federal law and administration of
justice in the United States.
It is equivalent to “what” of other countries?
A: The justice or interior ministries.
The department is headed by whom?
A: The U.S. attorney general, who reports directly to the president of the
United States and is a member of the president's Cabinet.
Who is the current attorney general?
A: Merrick Garland, who was sworn in on March 11, 2021.
The modern incarnation of the Justice Department was
formed in 1870 during what presidency?
A: Ulysses S. Grant.
The department comprises federal law enforcement
agencies, including what?
A: The Federal Bureau of Investigation, the U.S. Marshals Service, the
Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, the Drug Enforcement
Administration, and the Federal Bureau of Prisons.
It also has what eight major divisions of lawyers who
represent the U.S. federal government in litigation?
A: The Civil Division, Criminal Division, Civil Rights Division, Antitrust
Division, Tax Division, Environment and Natural Resources Division, National
Security Division, and Justice Management Division.
The department also includes the U.S. Attorneys'
Offices for each of what?
A: 94 U.S. federal judicial districts.
The primary actions of the DOJ are what?
A: Representing the U.S. government in legal matters (such as in cases
before the Supreme Court) and running the federal prison system.
The department is also responsible for reviewing the
conduct of whom?
A: Local law enforcement as directed by the Violent Crime Control and Law
Enforcement Act of 1994.
The office of the attorney general was established by
what?
A: The Judiciary Act of 1789 as a part-time job for one person.
At one time, the attorney general gave legal advice to
whom?
A: The U.S. Congress, as well as the president.
Until March 3, 1853, the salary of the attorney general
was set by statute at less than what?
A: The amount paid to other Cabinet members.
Early attorneys general supplemented their salaries by
doing what?
A: Running private law practices, often arguing cases before the courts as
attorneys for paying litigants.
In 1867, the U.S. House Committee on the Judiciary, led
by Congressman William Lawrence, conducted an inquiry into what?
A: The creation of a "law department" headed by the attorney general and
composed of the various department solicitors and United States attorneys.
On February 19, 1868, Lawrence introduced a bill in
Congress to create what?
A: The Department of Justice.
Who signed the bill into law on June 22, 1870?
A: President Ulysses S. Grant.
Who did Grant appoint as attorney general?
A: Amos T. Akerman and Benjamin H. Bristow as America's first solicitor
general the same week that Congress created the Department of Justice.
The department's immediate function was to do what?
A: To preserve civil rights.
It set about fighting against domestic terrorist groups
who had been using what to oppose the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments to the
Constitution?
A: Both violence and litigation.
Both Akerman and Bristow used the Department of Justice
to vigorously prosecute whom in the early 1870s?
A: Ku Klux Klan members.
In the first few years of Grant's first term in office,
there were how many indictments against Klan members?
A: 1000, with over 550 convictions from the Department of Justice.
By 1871, there were 3000 indictments and 600
convictions, with most only serving brief sentences, while the ringleaders
were imprisoned for how long?
A: Up to five years in the federal penitentiary in Albany, New York.
What was the result?
A: The result was a dramatic decrease in violence in the South.