Petit jury

“ In order that the juries in the United States may be legal—that is, in accordance with the principles of the common law—it is necessary that every adult male member of the state should have his name in the jury box, or be eligible as a juror. ”

“ Even more than this, the names of the twelve jurymen and of the two supplementary jurymen will certainly be published in the French newspapers with details about the men themselves and their professions, before the trial begins, and this of itself forms an abuse which must inevitably react on the absolute impartiality of a jury, which should be a first necessity of any criminal trial in any country, for numbers of newspapers will tell them what they ought to do and what their verdict ought to be. ”

“ We told you, in reference to the Laurada trial, that it was necessary for all the twelve jurymen to agree before a verdict could be secured.
When a trial is finished and the case is given to the jury, the jurymen in the charge of the sheriff are locked up in the jury-room and kept there until they arrive at a decision or the judge dismisses them.
When the jurors arrive in their own room, a ballot is taken, and if the vote is not unanimous they begin a regular discussion of the case. ”

“ Kneel, Jurymen, oh, kneel!
(All the Jury kneel in the Jury-box, and so are hidden from audience.)
Usher.
Oh, will you swear by yonder skies,
Whatever question may arise,
'Twixt rich and poor—'twixt low and high,
That you will well and truly try.
Jury (raising their hands, which alone are visible) . ”

“ But with a trained panel of jurors, at the end of the second week of the term, the chaff having been separated from the wheat, the prosecution may reasonably expect to see the mill of justice grinding smoothly and reasonably fine, the jury at home in the court-room, familiar with their duties, and appreciative of the fact that all the assistant is trying to accomplish is the disposal of as many cases as possible consistent with fair trials and just verdicts. By the middle of the term he must be a very indifferent sort of fellow if he has not made friends of the jury ”

“ The jury in a criminal trial in Paris does not, as a London jury does, melt into disappearance before the final verdict. There are a few solemn words from the judge, there is a rustle as the lawyers gather up papers and sit back, and then fourteen very ordinary, very weary good men and true, whose faces we had only seen in profile until then, rise in their places. ”

“ It gives the defendant a reasonable opportunity to ascertain the qualifications of proposed jurors, and to protect himself against any supposed prejudices in the mind of any particular individual called as a juror. Whether better or no than any other method, it is certainly a fair and reasonable way of securing an impartial jury, was provided for by the laws of the state, and that is all that due process in this respect requires. ”

“ This lawyer now selects a jury in thirty minutes.
Of course, some examination into the general qualifications of jurors and their possible bias in the case is imperative, and frequently the interposition of a peremptory challenge is not only justifiable, but absolutely necessary. A talesman will sometimes betray by an inflection of his voice a sentiment or prejudice which his words deny, or suggest to the vigilant counsel for the defendant the juror's susceptibility to the insidious flattery of the prosecutor in making him a part of the "organization of the court." ”

“ To preserve the integrity of the jury system, prospective jurors need to be educated not only about the size of a jury verdict, but also the basis of the verdict and the power of the trial court to rectify inappropriate verdicts. ”

“ The jurors were sworn in,—a special jury,—and long was the time taken, and many the threats made by the Chief Justice, before twelve gentlemen would consent to go into the box. Crowds were round the doors of the court, of which every individual man would have paid largely for standing-room to hear the trial; but when they were wanted for use, men would not come forward to accept a seat, with all that honour which belongs to a special juryman. ”

“ In the selection of the jury we had the advantage. None of the roughs could get on the panel to hang the verdict, for the simple reason that they were all too well known. The miners cautiously refused to endorse any one whose general respectability was not known to them. I found myself one of those selected.
A slight barrier consisting of a pole thrown across one corner of the room set aside a jury box. We took our places therein. Men crowded to the pole, talking for our benefit, cursing steadily, and uttering the most frightful threats. ”

“ There are connotations about the word challenge which are essentially dramatic. It implies a battle, a duel, a tournament.
It is difficult to ascertain exactly what principles govern the successful examination and selection of a jury. In Massachusetts and in certain important cases in New York, the whole panel of jurors summoned for the term of court have been investigated by detectives in order that the lawyer might have information about who was to be rejected or accepted as a juror to decide the case. ”

“ We entertain no doubt that the orderly conduct of a trial by jury, essential to the proper protection of the right to be heard, entitles the parties who attend for the purpose to be present in person or by counsel at all proceedings from the time the jury is impaneled until it is discharged after rendering the verdict. Where a jury has retired to consider of their verdict, and supplementary instructions are required, either because asked for by the jury or for other reasons, they ought to be given either in the presence of counsel or after notice and an opportunity to be present ”

“ When the time comes for the selection of a jury they wait for their names to be called with the thought that the axe is about to fall. As they are examined they answer the questions of their occupations and opinions truthfully, but if for any reason they are excused, they leave the box with a smile at those impaneled and a sigh of relief as at danger escaped. ”

“ What a jury, even nowadays, a jury of only twelve persons, would be if left entirely to impulse and party feeling, any lawyer will readily conceive. How much more capricious, uncertain, and prejudiced a jury of five hundred, and, in some instances, of one thousand or fifteen hundred! ”

“ If jurors were appointed instead of being selected by lot, persons having prejudice or ill feeling against one of the parties in the case might be put on the jury, and the verdict rendered by such jury might be a very unjust one. ”

“ During the sessions, the petty jury may be empanelled every day, and when their names are called on, the defendants or the plaintiffs may raise objections to them if they please: that is to say, they may have some one appointed on the jury in place of anyone about whom they have any doubts; but when the twelve persons have once been sworn in as the petty jury, no change can be made. ”

“ Since the detection and exposition of that infamous list of jurors, out of which a jury used to be packed for the Crown whenever it was prosecutor, some sort of reformation has taken place in the manner of appointing a jury, so as to leave a better chance of having disinterested men on the jury. ”

“ The determination of a trial by jury we hold to be less satisfactory, and less likely to be in accordance with fact; so easy is it in some instances for a clever counsel to frighten witnesses, to get fallacious evidence, and to represent his client’s cause, and appeal to the passions of the jurors of very miscellaneous mental calibre, often with more feeling than judgment, and generally to use all those arts which are thought legitimate by the practitioners of the law to win a verdict. ”

“ But it does mean that prospective jurors shall be selected by court officials without systematic and intentional exclusion of any of these groups. Recognition must be given to the fact that those eligible for jury service are to be found in every stratum of society. Jury competence is an individual rather than a group or class matter. That fact lies at the very heart of the jury system. ”

“ In some States all the jurors must agree, or there is no verdict. In other States the jury may render a verdict by the agreement of less than the whole number of jurors. Under certain regulations a party to a suit may challenge, that is, reject, a part or all of the jurors, and have others selected in their stead. ”

“ Each individual shall have the right of challenging six of the jurors without cause, and others for sufficient cause, and of the remaining number, twelve shall be drawn by lot to sit in the case. It is necessary that the verdict of the twelve composing the jury be unanimous. ”

“ When the affidavit of a juror, as to the misconduct of himself or the other members of the jury, is made the basis of a motion for a new trial, the court must choose between redressing the injury of the private litigant and inflicting the public injury which would result if jurors were permitted to testify as to what had happened in the jury room. ”

“ Yet exercise of this power, with respect to which, as Lord Coke expressed it, "the jurors are chancellors," has made the jury an unsatisfactory tribunal in many classes of cases. It is largely responsible for the practice of repeated new trials which makes the jury a most expensive tribunal. ”

“ Not only is much more provision made for the waiver of jury trial in all States, at least in criminal cases, and for a trial by the court without a jury unless it be specially claimed, but there is a distinct tendency to have juries less than twelve in number, and verdicts not unanimous, but made up of three-fourths, two-thirds, or even a simple majority ”

“ At various periods, and in particular previous to 1848, the French administration instituted a careful choice among the persons summoned to form a jury, picking the jurors from among the enlightened classes; choosing professors, functionaries, men of letters, &c. At the present day jurors are recruited for the most part from among small tradesmen, petty capitalists, and employes. Yet, to the great astonishment of specialist writers, whatever the composition of the jury has been, its decisions have been identical. ”

“ The jury offers a fertile field for the study of human nature, and lawyers and prosecutors learn to look regularly for certain characters. Of these may be mentioned the too officious juror who asks hundreds of incompetent and irrelevant questions to which the lawyers are naturally afraid to object, and whose inquisitiveness has to be curbed by the court itself. ”

“ The Grand Jury is a body of men chosen from the taxpayers of a county to inquire into alleged crimes during a particular term of court. The supervisors or the commissioner of jurors makes out a list of three hundred names of men of integrity and sound judgment, from which the names of twenty-four men are drawn by lot. [B] From sixteen to twenty-three of these men sit in secret session, and hear the presentment of a case, and decide by a vote of at least twelve members whether the evidence is sufficient to warrant holding the accused for trial. ”

“ To-day, as then, though twenty years have passed, there is no possibility of success, no chance of getting an engagement, for a pupil on leaving the Conservatoire, unless a certain all-powerful critic, supreme judge, arbiter beyond appeal, sees fit to pronounce a decision confirming the verdict of the Examining Jury. This extraordinary man holds the future of each candidate in the palm of his fat and heavy hand. ”

“ The fact that the prosecutor appears every day before the general panel of jurors in the Part to which he is assigned throughout the term and soon gains among them the reputation of being fair, and that he on his side knows their peculiarities and idiosyncrasies is what makes the jury system in criminal cases work more accurately and accomplish better results than in civil trials, where the jury usually has never seen either counsel before and probably distrusts both of them. ”

“ The Court has the right to excuse a juror if he is not on the assessment roll. The Supreme Court has decided that a man has the right to be investigated by a Grand Jury of nineteen men who are qualified according to the statute and none others. It is not necessary to take for grand jurors the nineteen whose names are first drawn from the box. ”

“ The attorney for the commonwealth—that is, the attorney who prosecutes the accused—may CHALLENGE—that is, object to—a juror, but he must assign a reason for his objection, and if the judge decides in favor of his objection, the person challenged is not put on the jury. A panel is a list of persons summoned to serve as jurors.
To SUMMON is to call or notify a person or persons to appear in court. A person who is summoned to attend as a juror and who, without sufficient reason, fails or neglects to do so, may be punished by a fine of not less than five nor more than twenty dollars. ”

“ The government has presented the result of elaborate research to show that throughout the long period from the development of the jury system to modern times, the English common law permitted a servant of the King to serve as a juror in crown cases, provided he had no actual bias. ”

“ I hear there’s to be a jury; and I always heard, if there’s one thing the L—d don’ know, it’s how a jury’s goin’ to decide.”
“I ain’t afeared of that jury,” said Still, on whom the whiskey was working. “I’ve got——” He caught a look of sharpness on the man’s face and changed. “I ain’t afeared o’ no jury—that jury or no other. And I ain’t afeared o’ Jacquelin Gray nor Mr. Steve Allen neither. I ain’t afeared o’ no man as walks.” ”

“ And, its exercise must always accord with the fact that the proper functioning of the jury system, and, indeed, our democracy itself, requires that the jury be a truly representative of the community', and not the organ of any special group or class. If that requirement is observed, the officials charged with choosing federal jurors may exercise some discretion to the end that competent jurors may be called. ”