This week the General Services Administration (GSA), which manages most federal buildings, released a list of federally owned properties that it would consider closing and selling off as part of the new administration’s cost-cutting measures. The list included approximately 20 federal district courthouses, which are owned and maintained by the GSA and leased to the judiciary. It also includes other offices used by court adjuncts, like probation and pretrial services, as well as immigration and bankruptcy courts (which formally fall under the Article I authority of the U.S. Congress).
The list was released on Tuesday and then removed from the GSA’s website the next day. But those who saw familiar buildings on the list are not happy. Most prominently, both of Minnesota’s Senators wrote a letter opposing the proposed closure of the federal courthouse in Fergus Falls.
How this will ultimately play out is anyone’s guess. But it is an excellent illustration of the courts’ resource dependence. The judiciary is a coequal branch of government, yet it does not own or control its own courthouses or equipment, cannot hire its most important employees, and has virtually no mechanism for raising money on its own. The courts must be especially nimble in managing these dependencies, especially in fraught political times.
The Interdependent Third Branch 