The Daily bulletin. [volume] (Honolulu [Hawaii]) 1882-1895, 1889-06-05
rAE jury SYSTEM.
(FTom the Hilo Record, Nay 81. }

Whether the system of jury trials
should, or should net, be preserved,
has, and is now exercising the minds
of some of our best thinkers. On
this score, we at this time shall at
tempt no discussion. What we have
to do with, is the thing as we now
have it. BY our Constitution and
Statutes, we have the guarantee of
jury trial, and it is with that we are
now dealing. BY Statute the Clerks
of the several Circuits, sin concert
with Judge Of some Court of Re-
cord, shall prepare, semi-annually,
a list of the names of fifty Hawai-
ians, who, in their opinion, are fit to
serve as jurors. From which num-
ber, the Clerks shall draw panel
of "a jurors, to serve at the terms
of the Circuit Courts" But in the
Circuit Courts, no foreign jury is
drawn in that manner; but, if the
presiding Judge shall find it neces-
sary to have a foreign jury, he shall
summon one from among the resi-
dents of the District. This was
done on account of the fact, that,
at the time of making the law, for
eign cases were very rare. Now
this is all changed, and the foreign
cases on our calendars are far
in excess of the Hawaiian ones. A
Judge, however fair-minded and I'M
biased he may feel himself to be,
should not be the one to draw a
panel of jurors to try any case to
be heard before himself. Thus: q
Judge who may believe in total pro-
hibition would be very apt to draw,
as nearly as possible, panel of
jurors to try liquor case, who felt
in the same way. Whereas, we be-
lleve that fairness would say, they
ought to be drawn from amongst
those who were not total prohibi
tionists, but who did believe that
intemperance was an evil. We would
not put an habitual drunkard on the
panel to try such a case, but we
would not have a picked jury to try
it. So we say that the time has now
come, when the foreign juries in oul
Circuit Courts should not be sum-
moned by the Court, as at present,
but in some other way. We do not
believe that the present method OF
drawing juries is the right one.
Every man if physically able TO do
jury duty, and who by our Statute
is liable to do it, should be called.
AS it now is, the old jury list is
called year after year, and the same
men, term after term, are called to
serve. This is not fair. We think
that it would be q fairer method, To
have the Assessor of the District file
each year with the Clerk of the
Court of his District, full list Of
all those men in that District liable
to do jury duty. From that number
jury might be impaneled, loo
names being taken in order there
from, thus giving every man ;
chance to serve or not. There ough
not to be any favoritism shown il
the drawing of juries. In order tt
lessen the expense of keeping 81
many jurors in attendance for 81
long time, it would be no Difficult
matter to notify them "a hours il
advance, of when their service
might be needed. We hope tina
something may be done in this mat
ter at the next Session of the Legis
lature. In this connection, we will
say that we hear all those juror
who we're summoned to appear a
the Court this Term, outside of TIL
regular panel, are not allowed any
thing for their attendance, excep
those who happened to be drawn
We hardly think it is so, but if it i
true every man so summoned, if h
refused to appear, is by law liabl
to a fine of 500. Now why SHOULD
not the juror, if liable for non-at
tendance, be able to claim his fec
if he does attend? We think it
poor rule which will not work bot
ways.