Boyd’s Bible Dictionary:
(drive to). This right acknowledged by Jewish law (Deut. 17:8-9). It lay to the judges (Judg. 4:5); then to the kings; later to a special tribunal (2 Chron. 19:8-10; Ezra 7:25); finally to the Sanhedrim. Paul appealed to the Roman Emperor (Acts 25:11).
Concise Bible Dictionary:
It would appear from the arrangements made by Moses that some of the judges were accounted as judges of appeal, but that Moses himself, as having the mind of God, was the ultimate judge (Ex. 18:13-26). It is not probable, when the kingdom was established, that all causes were tried at Jerusalem; but only cases of appeal from the tribal judges; and it was such that Absalom alludes to in 2 Samuel 15:2-3; see also Deuteronomy 16:18. It is evident from Deuteronomy 17:8-12 That the mind of God was to be sought where He put His name, if the matter was too hard for the judges. The Jewish writers say that before and after the time of Christ on earth, appeals could be carried through the various courts to the Grand Sanhedrim at Jerusalem.
In the case of Paul appealing to Caesar, it was not an appeal from a judgment already given, as is the case in what is now called an appeal; but Paul, knowing the deadly enmity of the Jews, and the corruption of the governors, elected to be judged at the court of Caesar, which, as a Roman, he had the right to do (Acts 25:11). There is One who “cometh to judge the earth: with righteousness shall he judge the world, and the people with equity” (Psa. 98:9).