The United States Constitution, as we all learned in our civics classes, was designed to split government power over three branches: the Executive, comprising of the President and cabinet; the Legislative, which is Congress; and the Judicial, which the constitution vaguely defined. Other than establishing a “Supreme Court” and inferior courts, the only other action taken to establish the court system we have today was an Act establishing the 13 regional “circuit” courts of appeals.

On this day, February 1st, in 1790, the newly-established United States Supreme Court convened. They didn’t even have a building to themselves yet, having to meet in the Merchants Exchange Building, in the capitol, New York.

The first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court was John Jay, one of the Founding Fathers and a man instrumental to the Continental Congress and early American efforts to establish their independence. Jay was deeply involved in creating the Constitution of the United States and served as the nation’s Chief Justice prior to the establishment of the court. Along with fellow Founding Fathers James Madison and Alexander Hamilton, he wrote several of the articles of the Federalist papers, which remain the cornerstone of American law.