United States Department of Justice

On July 1, 1870, President Ulysses S. Grant signed the act that created the United States Department of Justice, transforming the part-time Attorney General role into the head of a full-fledged executive department. Before that, the Attorney General had operated without a staff or office, offering legal advice to presidents from 1789. The new department centralized federal prosecutions and legal representation, giving the government a unified legal arm.

Today, the DOJ oversees more than 115,000 employees across over 40 component organizations. Its reach extends from the FBI and DEA to the Bureau of Prisons and the U.S. Marshals Service. The department's legal divisions handle everything from antitrust to civil rights, and its grant programs funnel billions to state and local law enforcement. The Robert F. Kennedy Building at 950 Pennsylvania Avenue serves as headquarters, but DOJ personnel operate in all 50 states and more than 50 countries worldwide.

The department's mission statement is straightforward: to uphold the rule of law, keep the country safe, and protect civil rights. That mission has been tested repeatedly, from the Watergate prosecutions to the 2020 antitrust case against Google, which in August 2024 resulted in a landmark ruling that Google illegally maintained monopolies in search and text advertising. The DOJ also charged over 1,500 individuals in connection with the January 6, 2021 Capitol breach, one of the largest federal investigations in American history. [edit]