The Federal Courts Improvement Act of 1982 did that. District judges are about geographical boundaries and need to make decisions about every kind of subject ar

The Federal Courts Improvement Act of 1982 did that. District judges are about geographical boundaries and need to make decisions about every kind of subject area, but Federal Circuit court judges operate based on subject area. That way a patent lawyer that want to be a judge handling patents can go to the Federal Circuit court, and unsurprising a very large portion of Federal Circuit court judges are past lawyers working in industry with companies within the same subject area. As a result it is not very strange that a court packed with past IP lawyers are biased towards maximalist interpretations of IP law.