What is wrong and good with our jury system in the United States(The Pro's & Con's)?

Hello.

Bertel M. Sparks wrote a great article, "Trial by Jury vs. Trial by
Judge," which appears on the web site libertyhaven.com:
http://www.libertyhaven.com/politicsandcurrentevents/constitutionscourtsandlaw/trialjudge.shtml

The following is my summary of some of the main points made by Sparks.

Problems with the jury system:

(1) Time. Jury trials often take two or three times longer than judge
trials.

(2) Incompetence. Jurors typically have little legal experience, and
are not necessarily well-educatedy. They may have difficulty
understanding not only the judge's instructions but even the facts of
the case.

(3) Personality. Jurors may be tempted to view a case as a contest
between two lawyers and decide the case in favor of the side that they
like best.

Benefits of the jury system:

(1) Community representation. The jury is a representative group from
the community. Its decision are more likely to reflect society's view
of justice.

(2) Flexibility. Judges are more likely to mechanically apply laws.
Juries are more likely to emphasize fairness rather than a narrow,
legalistic view of the world.

(3) Democracy. Ordinary citizens participate in our governmental
system in two ways: voting and jury service. Abolishing jury service
would undermine democracy.

(4) Freedom. In criminal cases, a defendant's freedom (and in some
cases life) is at stake. Personal freedom is too important to leave in
the hands of just judges and lawyers. If the government wants to take
away a person's freedom (or life) the whole society must assent. The
jury is a microcosm for the whole society.

Here are some other interesting articles on the subject:

"Unlocking the Jury Box"
By Akhil Reed Amar & Vikram David Amar
Policy Review May-June 1996, on Policyreview.org:
http://www.policyreview.org/may96/amar.html

"Our Precious Jury System: It?s Passed the Test of Time"
By James W. Gilchrist, Jr., on the web site of turnipseed.net:
http://www.turnipseed.net/jimart2.htm

"Jury Verdicts Essential to Democratic Justice"
By Philip M. Damashek, on the web site of lawyer1.com:
http://www.lawyer1.com/lawyers/library/systems_1.htm

The following speech is from Australia, but many of the same
principles would apply to U.S. juries:
"Delivering Justice in a Democracy III - The Jury of the Future"
by The Hon Justice M D Kirby, from the High Court of Australia:
http://www.hcourt.gov.au/speeches/kirbyj/kirbyj_dublin1.htm
search strategy: "jury system," democracy, freedom, competence
I hope this helps.

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Clarification of Answer by juggler-ga on 26 Jul 2002 21:33 PDT

I should note that "well-educatedy" should obviously have been
"well-educated." Sorry about that.

That article dates to 1957, and serves perhaps as an interesting
reflection on jury attitudes of the time. At that time, most
jurisdictions required jurors to be landowners. That means that they
tended to have some assets. In many jurisdictions, including many
which are now (and were then) relatively urban, in a county court the
jury pool was dominated by farmers. This presented the issues of
education outlined by the author, and also skewed down damages awards
for tort cases. Farmers of that era didn't feel that the loss of a
finger, eye, or even an arm was particularly catastrophic - farm
accidents causing injuries of that type were not uncommon, and they
certainly did not mean that the farmer or farm worker would be
magically granted enough money to retire. My guess is that this was a
written speech for a luncheon presentation, perhaps for a bar
association. I doubt it was for a lay audience, as opposed to lawyers,
as the reference to Dean Wigmore seems to assume that the audience
will know the name.

(And I can't help wondering if all of this is going into somebody's
homework. ;-)