Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1892-04-17
A JURY OF OUR PEERS.
Snap Shots in the Court House Reveal
Odd Pictures Sometimes.
THE CORPS OF PROFESSIONALS
Who Keep One Eye on the Wheel and the
Other on the Treasury.
BAD SAMPLE PARTICULARIzED
WRITTEN FOR THE DISPATCH. ]

WRITTEN FOR THE p1sPATcH.l
The casual visitor to the Alleghen,
County Court House sees many things tha
make strong impression upon him. He i.
struck with the massive character of tn,
building itself. with the air of quiet bust
ness that pervades the place, with tn,
faces he meets in which repressed misery il
evident in spite Of all efforts to conceal it
with the brisk demesnor of the lawyers who
hasten hither and thither with an air of pro.
prietorship In the stately pile, and with the
utter lack of human sympathy that is par,
of the atmosphere Of all temples of justice.
He will see people in the Court House in
great numbers whom he never remembers to
have met anywhere else, and who seem
| indigenous to the soil, or rather dust, of the
law. Prominent among these people is the
professional juryman. u Strictly speaking,
there is no such thing as professional jury
man, because juries are supposed to be CON-
posed of citizens drawn at random from all
classes of citizens. But it is an undeniable
fact that the same men r,ay be seen on
juries over and over again, from. term to
term, for years. How they get there may
| be q mystery to those who do not under
stand how easy the jury system Of this
necessities of the men who are so often
found in the jury box.
How Jurymen Arc Drawn.
A certain number of names are placed in
Jury wheel by the County Commissioners,
and names are drawn from them every
month by a judge and commissioner to
supply enough jurymen for the use of the
court With the number of branches in
the Court House now, it will be seen that
several hundred jurymen are constantly
employed during the term. There are the
three Courts of Common Pleas, each court
having two rooms, the Criminal Court, the
Court of Oyer and Terminer and the Or
phans' Court
"Good men and true" must be used in all
these courts to render verdicts when the
evidence is in and the charge of the Judge
rendered, and the demand for these said
'good men and true" is large and continu-
Gus. Sixty names are drawn for panel for
each court monthly, and it takes about 8, 900
names for years service. The trick is to
get your name into the jury wheel. Many
The service, which is for two weeks at a
time, is paid for in cash at the rate of 50 q
day, and most mems time is worth more
than that. Thus it is that business and pro-
fessional men do not seek to get their names
into the jury Wheel and are, therefore, not
often called upon for jury duty.
The Men Who Like the Job.
On the other hand, there are hundreds of
men in the county to whom 50 day is q
goodly income. They can, perhaps, make
as much at their trades, whatever they may
be, but they have to work harder at them
than they do when in the jury box, to say
nothing of their chance of having their
names called and being declined by one side
or the other in certain cases. So they make
friends with the officials, who put the names
into the wheel, and see that they are in
cluded in the list If their names are in,
they must come out at some time or other,
and hence they enjoy the advantage of the
81 day for an occupation that does not
call for any manual labor, and is not par
ticular strain upon their mental faculties,
as rule.
These men.know all about the movements
of the courts, can check ydd off all the
Judges on their fingers, and can re-
peat the names of most Of the men,
bers of the Allegheny county bar
from memory, besides recognizing three
fourths OF the lawyers at glance. They de-
vote their lives to the Court House, and,
although not recognized as attaches of that
building, take as warm an interest in the
small talk of that place as if it were their
particular business to be informed on every
thing that goes on within and about its
stone walls.
Always Keep an Eye on ths Wheel
They have actually no more reason to be
interested in the Court House than any
ordinary citizen who is not drawn as jury
man once in his life; but since they are al
ways watching their opportunity to get
their names into the wheel, they feel that
they have more to do with it than even an
attorney with large court practice. Surely
it is not improper to speak Of these men as
professional jurymen. +,
Here is a case just about to be taken up in
one of the Common Pleas Courts. The work
of selecting jury is taking place. The
clerk of the court is calling the names.
civilian Slumkins!'' and a man with
closely-cropped hair, a shuffling gait and an
unmistakable seediness of garments an
swers "Here!'
''Go into the box" says the tipstaf, and
William Slumkins takes his place in the
front row at the end nearest the bench.
Unless William Slumkins is rejected BY
one side or the other, he will be the fore
O'Brienegan is the next, followed by Gott-
lieb Schultztag, Ivan Scowinsky, Patrick
Carrollton, Dennis Flanagan, Daniel /
Doyle, Herman Schwartzer and so on. 1t
is noticed that very few Hebrews are drawn
on juries, the names generally being those
of Irishmen and Germans.
A Pen Picture Of Some Juries.
When the IL names have been called, and
we look the jury over, it must be confessed
that it does not present very prepossessing
scribable suggestion of moldiness in the \
'tgood men and true" who are to decide the
merits of case that may perhaps involve
several hundred thousand dollars. The
average of intelligence does not seem to be
high, and as.the men sit blinking, yawning
and shuf1ing in their chairs, in all stages of
weariness and ennui, one. cannot help won.
dering whether the evidence and arguments
OF counsel, with the added weight of the
Judges charge, will enable them to give a
verdict in accordance with the facts as pre-
sented to them. 1t is possible that the jury
may not have been left out in the wet over
night, and hastily dried before being placed |
in the jury box, but it looks as if it had.
Several of the jurymen are discarded by |
the attorneys ior either side. who have a |
book with list of the names and occupa- |
tions Of the jurymen, and who reject them
for various reasons-generally because they |
are suspected of being indirectly interested |
in the parties to the suit, through acquaint- |
anceship or what not. There are other Jury
men sitting in court ready to take their !
places in the jury box if called upon, and,
in obedience to the demands of the attor- |
news, the clerk cries: civilian Slumkins,
retire. Samuel Smithingham take his
place"
Get Used to Being Retired.