The new North-west., 1890-09-12
THE GRAND JURY.
The grand jury adjourned after week
VI rapid and good work, having completed

"ltHcsses 10 tuG county seat NOW LulS is
all well intended and sounds well on its
face, but it absolutely amounts to nothing.
1t is impossible FOR justices If the peace
to act upon such Il suggestion. A Justice
OF the peace cannot try Il case unless it has
been brought before him. 1t would be a
good thing if he could try all the cases
within his jurisdiction which arise in his
neighborhood, and thus save the expense
of bringing them to the county sent, but
how is he to do ii unless the eases are
brought in his court. He cannot make
and file the complaint himself, and thus
become both prosecutor and judge. Nei-
thcr ought he, if he wants to be considered
an honest and fair judge, 70 ont hunting
fora man to make Il complaint, and thus
bring the case before himself, though this
is sometimes done. A Justice of the peace
who indulgcs i'll such practice will soon
make a nuisance Of his court Such Il
man is unfit to try Il case thus brought be,
fore him, brcauSe he is the real prosecutor,
though not 50 in name. 4 Justice of the
peace LIKING at q distance from the county
seat. is, therefore, i'll no way to blame if Il
criminal case happening in his nrirhbor-
hood is not brought before him. The
illustrations given by the grand jury are
very indefinitely stated. They say they
were "called upon to indict. in one in
st"ncc, for petit larceny The plain,
ordinary meaning Of this language is that
the guilty party had not been arrested
and tried before d justice Of the peace of
the ncighborhood where the crime was
committed. If this is what the grand jury
meant, then We ask them how Il Justice Of
the peace could try the case unless II was
brought before him? II may be that the
grand jury meant that the guilty party had
been committed for grand larceny to
await the action Of their body, aud that it
was afterwards found that tie was only
guilty Of petit larceny 1t is fair to pre-
sumo. i'll such an event, that the proof
showed before the justice Of the peace that
the criminal was guilty Of grand larceny,
and was therefore held, and that afterwartl
when the matter came before the grand
jury the witnesses very conveniently
changed their testimony, This often hap
pens. But, i'll either event. how eau tie
justices Of THO peace be blamed: .m
We cannot understand what the grand
jury means hv lis second Illustration.
They say "onc man was compelled To serve
four months Imprisonment, and no proof
was introduced Of any attempt To do wrong
the prisoner was only intoxicated and
sitting in front OF a saloon The grand
jury gives this as a reason why justices Of
the peace should dispose Of eases .wthn
their jurisdiction" but how it in anv way
proves that any justice Of the peace has
not done his duty, and his whole duty, we
do not comprehend Nov that case may
have been sNne outrage pcrpetratoa By.
some justic" Of the peace: but, if So the
grand jury should have "@one" for that
particular justice and not the whole tribe,
for ther" ar" many Just and honest men
among them.
What we presume the, grand Jury COM
plains about is that they wrrc compelled
Ia investigate small eases that might as
we'll have been tried and disposed nj by
justices of tho peace OF the nri~h hbOrhuuds
where the crimes We're committed. The
complaint i, \ good one in n,;ny instances,
but Absolutely Useless G>,lcss. for tile
reason 'lHt there is no WAY To prevent it.
Besides, in many eases. it might be very
proper to bring such eases before the
grand jury in the first instance IN fact
the grand jury is brought together 0rr;l-
-ion:,lly /" right wrongs whirl! otherwise
cannot be or have not been ri~h1cl.
Tn" grand jury further complain that
Witnesses are brought before Them who
have no material knowledge OF the cases
in which they are expected 10 testify. This
is another useless complaint. and to /, cer-
tain extent unjust. In til" first place it Is
utterly impossible for 4 person to tell, in
advance, what witness will testify to when
he is brought before the grand jury, al
though the witness does or ought to know
Ill about the cas-" in hand The practice
Is Tor the county attorney To subpoena wit
nrSSrS in advance Of the sitting of the
may not be kept waiting. This he is not
bound to do. But he subpTnacs such Wit
ncsscs AS are supposed to know something Q
OF the case, and such men as the records
show to be witnesses. 1t is not to be sup
posed that he would purposeiy bring men
before the grand jury who know nothin.
as witnesses. But suppose the county
attorney does not attend to this matter OF
subprnaing witnesses, but leaves it to the
grand jury to perform, as he has right tc
do. In such events it will be found that
the grand jury will make great many
more mistakes than the county attorney
In truth this is one of the things in the
business Of a grand jury that can never be
avoided. In the very nature Of the bust
ness Of grand jury it is their duty tc
ferret out crime, and in doing this, manv
useless witnesses will be examined, and il
will go continue till the millennium is
ushered in. That, therefore, which cannot
be avoided, must be endured.
The grand jury does, however, make
some good suggestions, which we will con
slider at future time. In the meantime il
might as well be known that such reports
Of grand juries, speaking upon public
questions, is no more than the expression
Of any other body Of men. Their sugges.
tions are necessarily crude, because the
jurors have no time to give thought to the
questions they undertake to discuss, and
they very often do injustice and sometimes
inf1ict pain by their hasty, illconsidered
and uncalled-for expressions of opinion
1t is no part Of their dnty-only a custom
and when men go outside their duty they
frequently do wrong. 1t is not long since
that grand jury in this county went out
side its duty to score a justice of the peace
because he had bound a man over without
evidence. 1t turned out that the man had
pleaded guilty to the charge before the
justice and the justice had nothing else tt
do but to bind him over, but the grand jury
had never examined the record before
| them, but scored the Justice all the same