Who Should Judge? Washington’s New Jury Law Under Fire

Of all the laws passed by the late legislature it would seem as if that one reforming the jury system should find favor in the eyes of the people and newspapers, and so far as can be seen the new jury law is intended to crush out the professional juryman who has so long been a curse. The Tribune, a newspaper here especially opposed to the law, and after denouncing the Republican party for acting as sponsor for it, says:

“If the American people have so low a grade of intelligence that they will submit to such oppression, they deserve to be slaves. They ought to be put in the stocks and the whipping post should be reestablished; the God-given rights of kings should be once more recognized, and we should teach the children contempt for those who own no land.”

The Tribune admits that the ostensible purpose of the Republicans was to abolish the professional juror and the irresponsible person so often found in the jury box, but declares that “now the property owner may be put upon the jury every day for a year, while the honest merchant, the intelligent clerk, the industrious and energetic mechanic, the hand-working and poorly paid farmer and the representatives of other just and honest people who happen to own no real estate are defrauded of their rights and the property owners are made the only men capable of deciding the facts in any case of law.”

This is absolutely untrue. Why should the poorly paid farmer, the mechanic and the clerk be compelled to leave his work, his shop or his office to do jury duty, and the banker or the merchant be practically exempt? The new law exempts neither clerk, banker, farmer, merchant, mechanic nor employer. It shuts out the professional juror by selecting 500 persons who shall be subject to call within one year in counties of the first to the seventh class, and 300 for counties of the eighth to the twenty-ninth, and disqualifies any person from serving upon a jury more than once each year. There can be practically no discrimination such as the Tribune speaks of, and none is intended.

It is equally untrue that only freeholders are eligible. The law says there shall be selected 500 persons “who shall be householders.” The legal definition of a householder is well established. The standard authorities describe a householder as “the head or master of a family, a person who occupies a house and has charge and provides for a family therein.” It seems a very rational precaution that any person charged with the duty of passing not only upon property and contractual rights of a fellow citizen but upon his personal liberty and even upon his life should have at least a local habitation and a name.

In Tacoma great praise has been passed upon the law and the consequent improvement in the character of juries; and the new system should have a fair trial before it is subjected to such unqualified condemnation as the Tribune utters. The notorious evasions of justice through the abuse of the jury system under the old law, and which have usually tended to the disadvantage of the poorer litigant, should make every newspaper in the state welcome any effort at remedial legislation.