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I pass over the appearance of the court, the empanelling of the jury, and the arraignment; for, in matters of mere legal forms, there is no great difference between civilized countries, all of them wearing the same semblance of justice.
Traditions of ante bellum custom proclaimed that "good society" in the town of X , formerly considered the precincts of courts as unfit for ladies as the fetid air of morgues, or the surgical instruments on dissecting tables; but the vanguard of cosmopolitan freedom and progress had pitched tents in the old-fashioned place, and recruited rapidly from the ranks of the invaded; hence it came to pass, that on the second day of the murder trial, when the preliminaries of jury empanelling had been completed, and all were ready to launch the case, X announced its social emancipation from ancient canons of decorum, by the unwonted spectacle of benches crowded with "ladies", whose silken garments were crushed against the coarser fabrics of proletariat.
Then the vast swindles which now, from time to time, disgrace our cities, will be unheard of. No voting of public money that, on its way to some city improvement, falls into the pockets of those who voted it. No courts of Oyer and Terminer, at vast expense to the people. No empanelling of juries to inquire into theft, arson, murder, slander, and black-mail.
This addendum is a fine specimen of verbose invective against 'the Church of Rome, the Pope, Bulls, Briefs, absolutions, etc., the empanelling 'en Grand and petty Jurys' of 'papist or popish Recusants Convict, and so on.
I heard the most eloquent of their advocates say, when comparing spiritual with credal conviction, "Our motto no longer is 'I believe, but 'I know." Belief may be instantaneous, but knowledge will be gradual; and so it is that, standing at a certain fixed point in very many years' study of spiritualism, I pause, and so to say, empanelling a jury ask the question it seems I ought to answer at others' asking Am I a Spiritualist?
In July the will was offered for probate, and upon the contestation was assigned by the surrogate to trial term for trial. The matter was prolonged into September there was difficulty in empanelling an unbiassed jury because of the moral sentiments involved. To Anthony's disappointment a verdict was finally returned in favor of the testator, whereupon Mr.
In regard to jurors in the courts of the United States, it is enacted, by act of Congress: "That jurors to serve in the courts of the United States, in each state respectively, shall have the like qualifications and be entitled to the like exemptions, as jurors of the highest court of law of such state now have and are entitled to, and shall hereafter, from time to time, have and be entitled to, and shall be designated by ballot, lot, or otherwise, according to the mode of forming such juries now practised and hereafter to be practised therein, in so far as such mode may be practicable by the courts of the United States, or the officers thereof; and for this purpose, the said courts shall have power to make all necessary rules and regulations for conforming the designation and empanelling of jurors, in substance, to the laws and usages now in force in such state; and, further, shall have power, by role or order, from time to time, to conform the same to any change in these respects which may be hereafter adopted by the legislatures of the respective states for the state courts."
A similar question was soon afterwards propounded to the persons drawn as jurors in the United States Circuit Court for the District of Massachusetts, by Benjamin R. Curtis, one of the Justices of the Supreme Court of the United States, in empanelling a jury for the trial of the aforesaid Morris on the charge before mentioned; and those who did not answer the question favorably for the government were again excluded from the panel.
First there was the lengthy process of empanelling a jury, with the inevitable accompaniment of challenges and objections, until the most unintelligent looking dozen of the panel finally found themselves in the jury box.
It has also been an habitual practice with the Supreme Court of Massachusetts, in empanelling juries for the trial of capital offences, to inquire of the persons drawn as jurors whether they had any conscientious scruples against finding verdicts of guilty in such eases; that is, whether they had any conscientious scruples against sustaining the law prescribing death as the punishment of the crime to be trick; and to exclude from the panel all who answered in the affirmative.
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