XLIITRIAL BY JURY
When I was an undergraduate at Yale, we were fortunate in having as one of our professors Edward John Phelps, who was unexpectedly appointed minister to England by Grover Cleveland, and who, after making a fine impression at the Court ofSt. James—do you know why it is called that?—returned to his professorship. He was fond of making general statements, not only concerned with his specialty, the law, but on anything that rose to the surface of his mind; so that to take his course was in itself a liberal education.
I well remember his beginning one lecture by saying emphatically, “Trial by jury is a good thing which has outlived its usefulness.â€
I believe that when he made that statement, he spoke the truth. If it was true then, it is certainly true now; nothing has happened since to improve the situation, or to make jury trials fairer or less expensive to the state. In America, we have two pieces of obsoletemachinery—the electoral college and trial by jury. When I began university teaching, one of my freshman pupils made the only interesting contribution to the workings of the electoral college that I have ever seen. I gave out as a theme subject, “The Electoral College,†and the first theme handed in opened with this sentence—“I do not believe in the Electoral College.†Well, neither did I, so thus far I agreed with my pupil; I read the next sentence to get his reasons; it was the next sentence that contained the original contribution to the subject, “The trouble is,†wrote the freshman, “that in the Electoral College everybody chooses snap courses.â€
Now the original idea on which the scheme of trial by jury was founded was as good as human ingenuity could devise. Any person accused of anything involving legal punishment was to be tried by a jury of his peers—twelve average, common-sensible, fair-minded men, who, after hearing all the evidence and the pleas of the lawyers, would bring in a verdict, which presumably would be in accordance with the facts, and therefore just. But in the course of time, although human nature has not changed, circumstances have, and it is difficult to avoid today the conclusion that the chief qualificationfor a member of a jury is that he should not be fit to serve. Unfitness is the only fitness. Anyone who has an opinion is barred; in order therefore for one to be eligible he must be one who knows little of the world in which he lives and who is curiously insensitive to what everybody is talking about. In a recent editorial in theNew Haven Journal-Courier, the point is well made.
An intelligent man even with prejudice would appear to be a better person to entrust the decision of life or death with, after the presentation of the evidence and the interpretation of it by counsel and the judge’s charge, than an ignorant person who knows too little of current life to form any opinions whatever upon any subject.
An intelligent man even with prejudice would appear to be a better person to entrust the decision of life or death with, after the presentation of the evidence and the interpretation of it by counsel and the judge’s charge, than an ignorant person who knows too little of current life to form any opinions whatever upon any subject.
Furthermore, it frequently happens that after a trial lasting for months the jury disagree, making another trial necessary, and involving an enormous waste of public money. There ought to be some better way of reaching a decision.
Then the very fact that the members of a jury are apt to be below rather than above the average person in intelligence, makes them particularly susceptible to emotional response when skilfully handled by a clever criminal lawyer. Only a short time ago a jealous woman deliberately murdered her husband and the woman shesuspected, although neither then nor at any time were they caught in a compromising situation; at the trial the evidence certainly looked black because it was all against the murderess. She was, however, an attractive physical specimen. Her lawyer stood her up in front of the jury, put his arm around her, and defiantly asked the jury if they were going to put to death this beautiful woman whose only offence was that she was a defender of the ideals of the home, American ideals. Should she, who stood so nobly and resolutely for family purity, be slaughtered? The jury acquitted her.
Furthermore, jury verdicts, instead of being in accordance with the evidence and with the law, are often determined by local sentiment. I remember two events in America at the same time, only in widely separated parts of our country. In the first instance, a husband who had for some time suspected his wife, happened to stumble upon the unmistakable proof of guilt; in a transport of rage, he killed his man. He was convicted of murder in the first degree, but the death sentence was commuted to imprisonment for life. He is in prison now. In the second instance, a husband hearing that his wife had gone to a hotel with another man, deliberately armed himself, went thither and killedboth. The local jury instantly acquitted him, and he was a popular hero.
I do not believe in capital punishment, and should like to see it abolished. But its sole merit, acting as a deterrent to crime, can be realised only in a country like England, where trials are conducted with absolute formality, where a decision is speedily reached, and where the verdict of guilty is speedily followed by execution. In the United States the murderer is too often a romantic hero, and has a long career as a great actor, whether or not he is convicted.
It seems to me that the best judges of any case are those who by education and training are best qualified to judge. It is significant that in Connecticut the prisoner may now choose to be tried by three professional judges rather than by twelve incompetent men. In a recent famous instance the prisoner did make that choice.
Too often a public trial by jury becomes a public scandal; of greater harm to the community and to the state than the crime of which the prisoner is accused.
Mark Twain said: “We have a criminal jury system which is superior to any in the world; and its efficiency is only marred by the difficulty of finding twelve men every day who don’t know anything and can’t read.â€