The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1891-12-23
JURY FAILURES.

A DISPATCH says that negotiations are
I proceeding for settlement of the DAVIS
Will case at Butte, Montana. The matter
has gone so far that it is expected the
dispute will be adjusted out OF court with
in three weeks. The contest has already cost
a good many thousands of dollars, all or
most of which must eventually come out
OF the estate of the dead millionaire. After
much preliminary skirmishing the case
was gotten before jury last summer,
aud one OF the most expensive trials
that has ever taken place in
the west followed. Hlgh-priced local at
torneys participated, and lawyers with
national regulations were brought from
the east, while numerous expert and ex-
pensive witnesses were employed. The
jury did not agree, and being discharged
the lltigants found themselves in precisely
the same position they occupied before the
commencement of the suit, with this ex-
ception-they were out a good deal of
money. Now, it seems, the parties have
gotten together and concluded that it will
be quite as well to divide the dead mans
millions among themselves as to scatter his
estate among lawyers and court officials.
This common sense view Of the case has
undou btably been brought about by a COM
temptation of the uncertainty of jury
agreeing upon a verdict
Right here in our own city we have Just
witnessed a long and exceedingly expen-
sive trial The time of the court has been
taken up DAY after day; scores of witnesses
have been in attendance, all of them more
or less expensive, and some of them gentle
men whose time and knowledge cost a
great deal of money. There was an i'm
mense array of lawyers, gentlemen who do
not appear in cases of this character with
out big fees. There was a jury
also, and when the Judge, the
lawyers, the experts and the witnesses
had all gotten through with their
parts, the jurors took the case wrestled
with 1t day or two and then agreed that
they could not agree; they were discharged
and the litigants hold the positions they
occupied before the opening of the suit.
These two cases, with both of which the
local community is familiar, are not unlike
hundreds of others which come before the
courts in every part of the republic every
OF the jury system and presenting forcible
arguments in favor of a change to a system
more in harmony with common sense.
Tho jury is not failure because
lurymen are lacking in intelligence or are
corrupt but because it is impossible for
twelve men to agree upon any proposition
which is not absolutely plain and incapa-
bic OF two interpretations Most of the YER
diets are reached by compromise, one or
mere OF the twelve men dong more or less
violence to their best Judgment; and when
The cases are intricate or involve large
sums, an agreement is the rare exception.
Jurors simply don't know the law, and
don't see things through the same specta-
cles, and too often honest prejudice for or
against one of the liiigants, interferes with
the proper exercise of jurors Judgment.
The jury comes very close to being a
humhug, and were it not for the fact that
1t affords slight degree of protection
against oppression. the system would be
abolished with as little ceremony as POSI-
Bile