Reasons for lay jurors in early modern and modern societies

Abstract

Abstract This chapter discusses why early modern and modern societies use juries. One of the strongest reasons is to alleviate the problem of bias among judges. In the eighteenth century, the prominent English writer William Blackstone gave this as a key reason for juries, and so did the Anti-Federalists at the founding of the United States. In South Korea and Japan in the 2000s, concern about judicial bias prompted introduction of jurors. In the United States, judicial elections make the problem especially acute. The nineteenth-century French political writer Alexis de Tocqueville best described another major rationale: the jury is representative of the people, a form of democracy. This theory proved persuasive in Europe, Latin America, and Southeast Asia. Tocqueville also articulated the novel concept of the jury as a school for democracy. A rationale that is often overlooked is that the jury serves the interest of legal professionals—judges and lawyers.