Posted on 03/12/2003 7:27:40 AM PST by The FRugitive
I just got called for jury duty for the first time.
I'm curious about jury nullification in case I get picked and get a consensual "criminal" case (tax evasion, drug posession, gun law violation, etc.). What would I need to know?
This could be my chance to stick it to the man. ;)
(Of course if I were to get a case of force or fraud I would follow the standing law.)
If I had the honour to sit on that jury I'd vote to acquit him .
They know that 1000 different Libertarian or libertarian-direction solutions, spawned by a common principle, work each separately and unsung in a 1000 different countries and places, and will not settle for the ‘worst practice’ of less.
For they also know that the country whose people first develop the wisdom to put these solutions to work combined all at once in their country will stamp their seal, so ending the saddest chapters of human history; and set their signature on the dawn of the most promising human times
The common principle is the prohibition of initiation of force, fraud and coercion. That leaves it to business and science to understand nature and then control nature. Thus it is an individual revolution and need not be formed as a common group that can be attacked as a whole. In turn, the status quo establishment doesn't know how to deal with individualism. They're being undermined and out-competed and literally have no winnable recourse. Save for joining the revolution by putting the individual first and accepting responsibility for their past crimes and deceptions foisted on what was then an unsuspecting masses.
Fortunately, the Founding Fathers weren't reductionist know-nothings.
"There never was a government without force. What is the meaning of government? An institution to make people do their duty. A government leaving it to a man to do his duty or not, as he pleases, would be a new species of government, or rather no government at all." -- James Madison
C'mon, Libertarians aren't wiser than Madison. Even arguing that they're wiser than Pee Wee Herman would be a stretch.
I didnt get picked - probably because my wife is a Pastor and I was reading a book about Revelation at the time - Interesting thing was that 75% of the jury panel I had been questioned with had been convicted of DWI at some point
(1) Defend religious freedom (the William Penn case, which was a hung jury because 4 jurors held out despite being jailed themselves),
(2) Defend freedom of speech (the Peter Zenger sedition case)
Note defense counsel Alexander Hamilton's comments -
"I know, may it please Your Honor, the jury may do so [ie, convict]. But I do likewise know that they may do otherwise. I know that they have the right beyond all dispute to determine both the law and the fact; and where they do not doubt of the law, they ought to do so. Leaving it to judgment of the court whether the words are libelous or not in effect renders juries useless (to say no worse) in many cases...."
(3) OR, Resist slavery (many abolitionists who broke the law by helping slaves escape, were acquitted by anti-slavery juries.)
Well? Are you prepared to say that Penn the Quaker should have been executed, Zenger the honest printer should have been silenced, and the Underground Railroad should have been put out of business? Or, can you admit that Jury Nullification has actually spared the lives and freedoms of some of history's heroes? Which side are you on -- blind application of the process of law, or pursuit of real justice --which, (mankind and the law of mankind being fallible) is sometimes not found in the law? Would you rather be Pharisees or Prophets?
That having been said -- I do agree with you partially. I regard Jury Nullification, a.k.a. Jury Lawlessness, as in the same category as Armed Insurrection: Both of these are necessary remedies that belong in the political medicine chest, but, they ought to be used only rarely, in extreme cases -- when no milder medicine will suffice. Just as the Founders in the Declaration stated that it would be wrong to overthrow the government for "light and transient causes", particularly if less severe remedies were still available, so too I would argue that the right of jury nullification ought to be exercised with great restraint.
But, like insurrection, nullification is a birthright that we must retain... just in case.
1st, 1st, 13th Amendments
Now it's about dope.
And guns, and abortion protestors, and... with all the "hate speech" codes, guess what, once again it's about freedom of speech and religion... full circle.
Libertarians learned from Madison and Jefferson that every power needed to have a check. This is the basic design of our constitutional order.
The juries right to nullify bad law (stupid,unconstitutional, unfair) is just that "check" thing against the power of the legislature. Jury trial was assiduously preserved in the constitution for just that reason. It was their intention that juries should enforce the constitution, to determine what laws were unconstitutional and check the legislative branch (Federal or state).
The judiciary took the job on for itself in an 1803 case but that did not eliminate the juries right to do likewise.
Ignorant nonsense.
"The Sixth Amendment calls for a jury trial in criminal cases and the Seventh for a jury trial in civil cases at common law where the value in controversy shall exceed $20. This court has ruled that consistently with those amendments trial by jury may be modified by a state or abolished altogether. Walker v. Sauvinet, 92 U.S. 90 ; Maxwell v. Dow, 176 U.S. 581 , 20 S.Ct. 448, 494; New York Central R.R. Co. v. White, 243 U.S. 188, 208 , 37 S.Ct. 247, L.R.A.1917D, 1, Ann. Cas.1917D, 629; Wagner Electric Co. v. Lyndon, 262 U.S. 226, 232 , 43 S.Ct. 589, 591."United States Supreme Court, PALKO v. STATE OF CONNECTICUT, 302 U.S. 319 (1937)
Backwards, naturally. BTW, ignorance is curable.
"By art. 7 of the amendments, it is provided, that 'in suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved.' This, as has been many times decided, relates only to trials in the courts of the United States. Edwards v. Elliot, 21 Wall. 557. The States, so far as this amendment is concerned, are left to regulate trials in their own courts in their own way."United States Supreme Court , WALKER v. SAUVINET, 92 U.S. 90 (1875)
"We have held over and over again that art. 7 of the amendments to the Constitution of the United States relating to trials by jury applies only to the courts of the United States . . . ." -- United States Supreme Court, Edwards v. Elliot, 88 U.S. 532
"Due process of law is process due according to the law of the land. This process in the states is regulated by the law of the state. Our power over that law is only to determine whether it is in conflict with the supreme law of the land,--that is to say, with the Constitution and laws of the United States made in pursuance thereof,--or with any treaty made under the authority of the United States.""This case shows that the Fourteenth Amendment in forbidding a state to abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States does not include among them the right of trial by jury in a civil case, in a state court, although the right to such a trial in the Federal courts is specially secured to all persons in the cases mentioned in the Seventh Amendment."
United States Supreme Court, Maxwell v. Dow, 176 US 581 (1900)
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