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| TRIAL BY JURY |
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| CHAPTER X |
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| MORAL CONSIDERATIONS FOR JURORS |
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THE trial by jury must, if possible, be construed to be such that a man
can rightfully sit in a jury, and unite with his fellows in giving judgment. But no man
can rightfully do this, unless he hold in his own hand alone a veto upon any judgment or
sentence whatever to be rendered by the jury against a defendant, which veto he must be
permitted to use according to his own discretion and conscience, and not bound to use
according to the dictation of either legislatures or judges.
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The prevalent idea, that a juror may, at the mere dictation of a legislature or a
judge, and without the concurrence of his own conscience or understanding, declare a man "guilty," and thus in effect license the
government to punish him; and that the legislature or the judge, and not himself, has in
that case all the moral responsibility for the correctness of the principles on which the
judgment was rendered, is one of the many gross impostures by which it could hardly have
been supposed that any sane man could ever have been deluded, but which governments have
nevertheless succeeded in inducing the people at large to receive and act upon.
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As a moral proposition, it is perfectly self-evident that, unless juries have all the
legal rights that have been claimed for them in the preceding chapters, – that is,
the rights of judging what the law is, whether the law be a just one, what evidence is
admissible, what weight the evidence is entitled to, whether an act were done with a
criminal intent, and the right also to limit the
sentence, free of all dictation from any quarter, – they have no moral right to sit in the trial at all, and cannot do so
without making themselves accomplices in any injustice that they may have reason to
believe may result from their verdict. It is absurd to say that they have no moral
responsibility for the use that may be made of their verdict by the government, when they
have reason to suppose it will be used for purposes of injustice.
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| 190 |
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It is, for instance, manifestly absurd to say that jurors have no moral
responsibility for the enforcement of an unjust law, when they consent to render a verdict
of guilty for the transgression of it; which verdict they know, or have good reason
to believe, will be used by the government as a justification for inflicting a penalty.
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It is absurd, also, to say that jurors have no moral responsibility for a punishment
indicted upon a man against law, when, at the
dictation of a judge as to what the law is, they have consented to render a verdict
against their own opinions of the law.
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It is absurd, too, to say that jurors have no moral responsibility for the conviction
and punishment of an innocent man, when they consent to render a verdict against him on
the strength of evidence, or laws of evidence, dictated to them by the court, if any
evidence or laws of evidence have been excluded, which they
(the jurors) think ought to have been admitted in his defence.
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It is absurd to say that jurors have no moral responsibility for rendering a verdict of
"guilty" against a man, for an act which he
did not know to be a crime, and in the commission of which, therefore, he could have had
no criminal intent, in obedience to the instructions of courts that "ignorance of the
law (that is, of crime) excuses no one."
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It is absurd, also, to say that jurors have no moral responsibility for any cruel or
unreasonable sentence that may be inflicted even upon a guilty
man, when they consent to render a verdict which they have reason to believe will be used
by the government as a justification for the infliction of such sentence.
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The consequence is, that jurors must have the whole case in their hands, and judge of
law, evidence, and sentence, or they incur the moral responsibility of accomplices in any
injustice which they have reason to believe will be done by the government on the
authority of their verdict.
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| 191 |
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The same principles apply to civil cases as to criminal. If a jury consent, at the
dictation of the court, as to either law or evidence, to render a verdict, on the strength
of which they have reason to believe that a man's property will be taken from him and
given to another, against their own notions of justice, they make themselves morally
responsible for the wrong.
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Every man, therefore, ought to refuse to sit in a jury, and to take the oath of a
juror, unless the form of the oath be such as to allow him to use his own judgment, on
every part of the case, free of all dictation whatsoever, and to hold in his own hand a
veto upon any verdict that can be rendered against a defendant, and any sentence that can
be inflicted upon him, even if he be guilty.
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Of course, no man can rightfully take an oath as juror, to try a case
"according to law," (if by law be meant anything other than his own ideas of
justice,) nor "according to the law and the evidence, as
they
shall be given him
.
"; Nor can he rightfully take an oath even to try a
case "according to the evidence," because in
all cases he may have good reason to believe that a party has been unable to produce all
the evidence legitimately entitled to be received. The only oath which it would seem that
a man can rightfully take as juror, in either a civil or criminal case, is, that he
"will try the case according to his conscience."
Of course, the form may admit of variation, but this should be the substance. Such, we
have seen, were the ancient common law oaths.
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