Jury Nullification Outreach
I was asked to help spread the word about this effort:
BLACK MARKET FRIDAY, BLACKOUT BAD LAW
Get involved in the efforts of bringing JURY NULLIFICATION mainstream.
NO VICTIM NO CRIME
If you’re in the NYC area or know someone who is during December up to January 5th donate your time to juror rights outreach. Outreach to take place at the Daniel Patrick Moynihan US Court House in NYC.
GET INVOLVED
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Fully Informed Jury Association
(406) 442-7800
http://www.FIJA.org
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Keep in mind the jury nullification is not the same thing as this type of nullification.
Also, the obvious disclaimers that you should be fully informed about the legal issues surrounding such strategies before you go down this path. The big picture here, however, is that I hear people all the time complaining that they can’t do anything individually to roll back an overbearing State. At the same time, they complain when they get called up for jury duty. Well…
The internet is really the only feasible way for us to educate everyone about this extremely important thing that we can all do for each other to increase our liberties.
People doing this on the street are at a much higher danger of being harassed and/or kidnapped by the police.
Here’s a riddle:
If Bob was a doctor, what would be his least favorite part of the physical exam?
First person to get it right gets a virtual high five.
Letting the patient leave with his braaain.
*High five*
Wrong, squirrel brains.
The correct answer is testing of the reflexes, because they are involuntary.
For now.
I’d like to think it would be the digital rectal exam
That is included in the Reflex examination, because in the process of performing the rectal exam, presumable to palpate the prostate, you will also be checking the tone of the internal anal sphincter, which is an involuntary smooth muscle.
You’d be put in the uncomfortable position of lying if you’re asked about it though. Admitting to believing in Jury Nullification is a pretty quick way to not actually wind up on a Jury. In fact it’s a strategy recommended for getting out of jury duty. And you can see the problem right away: you may be asked to swear that you will decide the verdict solely on the facts of the case. A belief, however justified, that a law is unjust and should be nullified, is not a “fact of the case” per se. So you either have to lie during this oath, which aside from probably counting as perjury, would perhaps pose a moral dilemma for some people, or admit to why you won’t swear it, which will probably get you tossed from consideration. Which is great if you hate jury duty, but not if you intend to use your power as a juror to make an important point.
Obviously, you know, great for those who manage to wind up on a jury anyway, but there’s probably more reason this hasn’t had a greater effect than “people who might do this hate jury duty.”
According to Judge Napolitano, the Constitution of Connecticut says judges have to inform the juries about jury nullification.
On the other extreme, I’ve heard of a court case where the jury asked the judge whether jury nullification was legal, and the judge said there is no such thing as legal jury nullification. As a result, the jury voted to convixt. The case was taken to appeal, with the defendant arguing that the judge had given the jury incorrect information about the law. But the appeals court said that if the jury had ignored the judge’s instruction and nullified anyway, that would have been within the jury’s right, but since the jury chose not to nullify, the fact that they were misled by the judge doesn’t change the fact that they had a right to do something and they chose not to do it.
Can you supply a link or reference? I have never heard of that.
The case is called U.S. v. Krzyske. It’s from the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals.
Thank you.
What a bunch of nonsense.
It says the jury is a judge of the law. That certainly allows judgment of applicability. Does it imply nullification? If it is read to allow nullification it must also be read to allow expansion. The jury would be able to decide being black while driving is not a crime according to what the judge says but it should be. That’s unacceptable most of us. So I think it is meant to cover normal issues of legal interpretation, not nullification.
Yeah, if you’re asked to take an oath that you’ll only judge the case based on the facts of the case, then there would be moral problems with doing jury nullification. But I don’t think such an oath is usually administered. But as far as the question “Do you think jury nullification is legally allowed?” you can truthfully answer no and still do jury nullification if you’re an anarcho-capitalist, since you would presumably see no moral obligation to follow the law. So in principle twelve anarcho-capitalists could all truthfully say they don’t believe in the legality of jury nullification, and then they could do jury nullification anyway.
But of course, there’s a case to be made that it’s immoral to just say yes to the question about the legality of jury nullification, without also mentioning that your views on the morality of jury nullification are different from that, because you’d be engaging in deception (akin to Jonathan Gruber’s deception in the Cadillac tax case.)
If you promise to decide on what the law is, and then decide on what you think the law should be instead, you’re a liar. if the judge instructs you on what the law is and you ignore him you’ve violated your oath.
Yeah, I was just saying that if there was no such oath administered, and the only thing which you were asked Is whether you believed that jury nullification was legal, then you could answer yes and nullify later without lying (although arguably you’d still be engaged in deception).
If you promise to decide based solely on the facts of the case… what relevance does the law have?
Since I am talking about the oath to decide based on what the law says I do not see how your question is pertinent.
Jury nullification does not require violating any oath to judge only on the facts of the case. One such fact that may apply is the injustice of the law enforcement that is the cause for why a person is a defendant.
Another fact that may apply is the demand by the court that you purposefully ignore certain facts when making a judgment. That is a fact that is also usable.
Finally, the “moral problem” you refer to is an argument that it is immoral to lie to those who may have lied which lead to the court case in the first place (not that cops telling the truth justifies a court case in being opened), and it is immoral to lie to those who would physicslly hurt you or the defendant unjustifiably if they wanted, in the name of their unjust law.
You seem to have a problem with lies, so why not support jury nullification when there are lies made about the defendant? Why not support jury nullification against unjust laws? You seem to only be able to write about how it may be immoral to lie as a means to nullification. What about how it may be moral to nullify, if lying against someone who demands you ignore pertinent facts is the only means to even be a member of the jury panel?
Would you lie to someone who intends to kill your wife? Would it be immoral to lie to those who hate, cheat, lie, and use unjust force?
MF, it has been common standard to word a juror’s oath in such a manner in the US:
“You, as jurors, are the judges of the facts. But in determining what actually happened–that is, in reaching your decision as to the facts–it is your sworn duty to follow all of the rules of law as I explain them to you.
You have no right to disregard or give special attention to any one instruction, or to question the wisdom or correctness of any rule I may state to you. You must not substitute or follow your own notion or opinion as to what the law is or ought to be. It is your duty to apply the law as I explain it to you, regardless of the consequences. However, you should not read into these instructions, or anything else I may have said or done, any suggestion as to what your verdict should be. That is entirely up to you.
It is also your duty to base your verdict solely upon the evidence, without prejudice or sympathy. That was the promise you made and the oath you took.”
So yes, it would be quite difficult for an ancap to make it past voir dire, let alone any actual proceeding as a juror (assuming that they answered all questions truthfully).
For instance, if during voir dire you are asked if you feel that drug prohibition is unjustified.
I would answer honestly and say that it is not justified. I immediately understand that this will disqualify me in the process of voir dire, and that it will surely mean that I will not be on that jury. However, my ultimate choice is between lying vs not lying. To me, that is something that I cannot do.
I simply will not lie due to a principle, because that only dissolves that principle altogether (due to my lie). If I were to lie in that case, then I’d be nothing more than an ideologue who is willing to do whatever is required to ensure my ideology; even lie, cheat, or steal (to name but a few); no different from a socialist who believes that the ends justify the means.
Even in the face of the State, I’m not prepared to stoop so low as a lier.
It has nothing to do with the lies of the State, rather it has to do with my own conscious and reputation. I don’t lie because I will not lie, not because of any consideration due to the lies of others,
That’s it for my jurisdiction.
Joseph,
Lying to stop an initiation of force does not put you on par with socialists.
You will never lie? Suppose a murderer asks you were your family is hiding. Are you seriously of the belief that it is better to have a blanket prohibition against lying, a norm of which will lead you to telling the murderer the truth, thus putting your family at the mercy of the murderer?
Even to the state you will not “stoop” to being a liar? I would say telling the truth to murderers and thieves is stooping to the level of helping them.
Joseph,
It is not my duty to base my verdict of a victimless accused on what any judge tells me.
It is not my duty to help aggressors create more victims by being honest with them such that I am prevented from helping my fellow human beings from unjust laws.
I will damn well follow my own laws that reduce aggression against the innocent, if I can get away with it. THAT is the honorable, virtuous, moral thing to do.
Well MF, there are also other considerations as to why I will not lie. I’m certainly not going to put myself in the position to be arrested on felony obstruction of justice and/or perjury charges just because I want to lie to get onto a jury. Further, if my lies are found out, not only will I face the above punishment and all that that entails, but also my time on that jury is null and void (my decision will mean nothing), if I even get that far (which I probably won’t).
So not only did I entirely screw myself, but I also screwed the guy who’s standing trial (by ensuring a jury nullifier will not be on the jury). Even though I have no positive obligation to the person on trial, I believe that honesty is the only way that I will ever be able to help him. And it goes without saying that in most cases any lie that I tell will be found out, because all one has to do is google my name to find out what my position is on a large number of things.
The more I think about that oath, the less I can agree with it, regardless of libertarian theory. If three witnesses say they saw a horse in the woods, but the law says there are no horses in that wood, only deer, then does the jury go with the witness and find a horse, or go with the law and find a deer? The law (as made by man) cannot create physical facts, the law can only create facts about law.
So the jury must follow the law and find a deer.
No wait, the jury have to find a horse?
Basing the outcome solely on the evidence implies ignoring any law that conflicts with said evidence.
The oath given above tries to pretend that both the law and the evidence have primacy, which is impossible.
The usual reading is that the evidence you can consider is solely the evidence allowed by the judge and presented in court. You ignore anything stricken, news reports, what your wife says. This often means ignoring evidence that in other contexts would be quite important.
A law that said there are no horses in the wood would be a very silly law. I am not sure there are many laws that try to dictate reality. Mostly they would say it is against the law for there to be horses in the wood.
However, this is why the nullification is important. For laws that are nonsensical – such as the horse one- the jury can decide on the facts. The law would then become unusable.
Where a law is considered by the majority to be unjust, then convictions will be difficult, such as the Fugitive Slave Act. This is a protection against tyranny of the state.
If the majority, or a sufficiently sizeable minority, believes the whole system is unjust, and nullifies on a regular basis regardless of the evidence, then the system will be unsustainable. This would be a demonstration that the Government did not have the consent of the population.
Why not vote? Politicians are quite flexible in their policies when votes are at stake.
Voting is another avenue. Why not both? My guess is that the majority do accept the right of the Govt. to govern, so it does have consent.
A couple of interesting example here when it has been used. The Fugitive Slave Act was a rejection of an unjust law. The failure to convict the KKK was refusal to accept a just law. It can go either way
An oath to whom? The question has no honor. A man who so easily absolves himself for destroying the life of an innocent on the pretense of following orders is a swine and a coward. Hell he has earned for hell has he wrought.
The jurisprudence in support of the validity of jury nullification is on the weak side.
There’s no point in having a jury if they’re not supposed to be able to nullify.
There is still a point in having a jury – to make findings of fact.
Of course there still is. It’s not the place of juries to nullify laws.
That’s what we are debating.
It is just a bad inference from juror’s immunity. Jurors cannot be charged for making the “wrong” decision. So they can in fact just decide to ignore the law and their oath. That’s how KKK members got off so often.
How common is it for there to be an oath that prohibits jury nullification?
Jurors swear to judge based on the evidence and the law. If the judge tells you shooting Medgar Evers was a crime but you think it should be legal for white men to shoot black men, so you acquit then you have violated your oath.
Jury nullification has a history in this country.
Okay. That doesn’t change what I said at all.
Yeah, Delphin was supporting you.
Thanks. I see that now.
Scratch that first reply of mine. That’s probably exactly how the concept came about.
Unlikely, seeing as it existed pre-clan.
Juries did not exist before clans existed. Clans go back thousands of years.
This is an absurd contention.
I think here clan refers to a particular klan, not clans in general. The first KKK started in 1865.
Bob, I asked this in a previous thread as well, but why don’t you think it’s a good idea to encourage jurors to nullify all laws, rather than just encouraging them to nullify laws against victimless crimes? Even if someone is guilty of murder, you don’t think the State should administer punishment, so why wouldn’t you encourage the jury to acquit in that case?
Would Bob be able to administer his own punishment, or hire someone who will protect him against the murderer and/or administer punishment?
Or are you expecting Bob to choose nullifying all state laws without also enforcing libertarian laws?
Your question cannot be answered without additional information, because the validity of libertarian ethics depends on a process of deduction, and eliminating certain premises makes the deduction impossible.
One person cannot be their own jury and judge. A third party is always necessary.
It is clear that many here do not share your scruples. Does this incline you to trust their plans for doing away with courts and laws?
Absolutely not. I’ve had someone hear ask me what was wrong with bounty hunters when I said they should be criminalized. I’ve had another one squirm like an eel, pulling post hoc rationalizations out of his posterior when I pointed out the gaping holes in his logic.
In my opinion, many libertarians’ understanding of law and politics is just surreal and wonky. Medieval Iceland as proto-ancap? Marriage as a contract? Pollution as trespass? Reducing all of law to property and contracts? Tragedy of the commons as a reason for privatization? The “free market” can “provide law”? These ideas are more than a little strange. Some of them don’t even count as wrong. A lot of them mix economics and its concepts with so many other things in just weird ways.
Nonetheless, engaging libertarians in conversation is…interesting. I think Bob is intelligent and genuine, even if I think he’s fallen for one or two illusions. He was kind enough to post my questions for him here on his blog and he show’s a willingness to engage challenges to his worldview.
Some of those ideas are correct. Privatizing, that is the use of ownership structures, does fix the tragedy of the commons. This can be demonstrated easily.
Pollution is a trespass as well, but the problem is that treating it as a tort rather than through collective action incurs huge transaction costs. Treating it as a trespass is inefficient and awkward, not incoherent.
Treating it collectively is highly subject to regulatory capture by vested interests.
For starters we could ask what happens to the money when those polluters pay fines, does it go to compensate the “victims” ?
No, it really doesn’t because most people who raise that particular objection are looking to protect the commons. Privatization would entirely miss their point.
Some animal rights activist don’t want wild animals to be owned. The Sea Shepherds, for example, would be against letting people hunt whales and your suggestion is entirely opposed to that desire.
What you call “protect” the commons is really just your desired use for that land.
Privatizing lands would maximize the value and minimize the violence and conflict.
It is also the most moral thing to do.
Common lands the world over are lands that were stolen from their homesteaders and free traders.
What you are looking at with common lands are robbed lands.
You should seek to protect people, not rocks and dirt.
Haha. Proof you are delusional right there.
No it’s proof I am more intelligent than you.
MF I am prepared to believe that “he started it” when it comes to the 8-year-old taunting, but as with 8-year-olds, I don’t care. This is ridiculous. Do you think anyone else wants to read this?
Well, no.
Isn’t value supposed to be subjective for Austrians. In either case, so what?
Err, no it wouldn’t. If people disagree with your you, then there will be conflict, private property or no private property.
Tell that to the Indians.
What you call “rocks and dirt” could very well be some people’s holy site or a nation’s crown jewels.
That’s probably what I should’ve said.
Murphy:
I welcome you to vaporize any comments you do not want to have showing on your blog.
S.C.
“What you call “protect” the commons is really just your desired use for that land.”
“Well, no.”
So you are purposefully advocating for something you do not prefer? Let me know when you square that circle.
“Privatizing lands would maximize the value…”
“Isn’t value supposed to be subjective for Austrians.”
Subjects cannot value when they have threats of violence against them for manifesting their non-violent values.
That value is subjectively determined does not I cannot say parking lots can be more highly valued than forests. I just look at what other human subjects are doing, and noticing that if they change a forest to a parking lot, it is because the parking lot makes human life better off, or else they would not do it.
“In either case, so what?”
So I hold human life and well-being as more important than the well-being of slugs, fish, and rodents.
“…minimize the violence and conflict.”
“Err, no it wouldn’t. If people disagree with your you, then there will be conflict, private property or no private property.”
The ethic of private property calls for individuals to respect each other’s private property rights. Private property does not just entail brainless zombies pretending they own the world doing whatever they want wherever they want, regardless of whether they are despoiling what belongs to others, and then it is up to the owner to defend his means of life with force.
Private property universally applied means that the way for people who disagree to settle their disagreements, and the way to settle which plan is carried out for the land and which plan is not carries out, is not might makes right, or a fight to the death, but the criteria that serves as intellectual justification is that the plan that ought to be carried out, is the plan of the owner.
This is a conflict solution.
This is not to say that everyone will follow it. Whether they do or do not has NOTHING to do with the justice of it. To say that you should not murder people, that murder is wrong, that the proper action for you to take is to not murder, has nothing to do with whether or not you will actually murder people.
Ethics are not a prediction.
“Common lands the world over are lands that were stolen from their homesteaders and free traders.”
“Tell that to the Indians.”
Glad you agree.
“You should seek to protect people, not rocks and dirt.”
“What you call “rocks and dirt” could very well be some people’s holy site or a nation’s crown jewels.”
Holy sight? You mean I ought to respect the property rights of those who homesteaded that land?
“Treating it as a trespass…and awkward…”
Why?
MF: “if they change a forest to a parking lot, it is because the parking lot makes human life better off, or else they would not do it.”
They would do it if they believed it made human life better off, even if it actually did not.
The tragedy of the commons disappears if the common disappears. Whether the situation is better or worse, you no linger have the tragedy of the commons if you privatise the commons. This is a reason of sorts.
The Grand Banks is a fairly recent failure to protect the commons. Had someone owned the fishing resource they may have been more successful in imposing restrictions on fishing.
Pumping CO2 into the atmosphere is another. If someone owned the atmosphere they may be more successful in stopping people putting CO2 into it for free.
These common lands and resources were stolen from anyone. They exist as common resource, with no easy mechanism to privatize them.
OMG, how dare someone question your assertion that bounty hunters should be criminalized? I know what you mean; it’s so annoying when people don’t just accept what I say as the ultimate truth. Don’t they realize that we should only pay bounties to cops to hunt people down!?
And, yes, you’re right, all their ideas are so strange, and therefore they must be wrong because of this strangeness or else they wouldn’t be strange.
S.C.
“Medieval Iceland as proto-ancap? Marriage as a contract? Pollution as trespass? Reducing all of law to property and contracts? Tragedy of the commons as a reason for privatization? The “free market” can “provide law”? These ideas are more than a little strange.”
To you. To others, they are not strange at all. Indeed, thinking the converse of those statements would be strange to them.
But what feels strange, or surreal, or wonky to a person does not mean those things are untrue, or logically flawed. You are not challenging an argument by declaring you feel weird about them. You are really just communicating to everyone that you choose not to intellectually engage the arguments.
Justice is served when certain actions are taken, not when only certain people with certain names act in that same way. That is not justice, that is cult of personality worship.
If a violence initiating thug is getting away with his deeds because a state either failed to stop him, or because they are protecting and financing him, then there is absolutely nothing immoral about a non-state protector of liberty, e.g. private bodyguards, private “bounty hunters”, etc, acting to seek justice for their victims.
You are absolutely delusional and I don’t see much point in responding to idiotic comments like the ones in this post of yours.
SC wrote:
You are absolutely delusional and I don’t see much point in responding to idiotic comments like the ones in this post of yours.
Rather than tell someone on this blog that he is delusional and there’s no point in responding to his “idiotic” comments, I would so much prefer that you actually didn’t respond.
S.C.
You haven’t shown how what I wrote is either delusional or idiotic.
That reaction of yours, the lack of argumentative substance, the name calling, is only proof that you are unable to psychologically handle ideas that conflict with yours.
Sorry. MF is just rather…a challenge.
S.C.:
Challenge in what way? Make an argument. Explain in detail how what I said earlier is wrong. Then explain what the truth is, and why.
So you support the idea of police getting paid to hunt people down, but not the use of a private contractor to do the same job? Would it help if those bounty hunters got issued a uniform?
Stupid objection is stupid.
Hey Samson,
Suck it up or you’re banned. You always have Gene’s blog to talk about how stupid everyone is here.
You haven’t shown how it is stupid.
Sorry, Bob. Got carried away.
OK.
You know, although I don’t really comment here anymore, I have over time and reading noticed essentially all the same things. In any event, juries have always had the power to nullify because they are the masters of the facts, and what they say happened happened. As a practical matter people need not worry too much about lying during jury duty. It is the commonest thing in the world and judges and attorney’s have developed many ways to deal with it. As the vast majority of people do not buy into and are not about to buy into the notion of sabotaging the jury system, or simply ignoring even dopey laws duly passed by their representatives under the current admittedly problematic system, lying or not lying makes little difference.
S.C.
I was the one who asked why you thought bounty hunters should be illegal, because your comments seemed to suggest that you do not really understand how bounty-hunting actually works. I made a long post explaining it to you.
Short version: when an accused posts bail, they sign a contract with the bail bondsman authorizing a bounty to come after them if they jump bail. A bounty hunter cannot go after someone who pays their own bail.
You would do well to go back and read some of your other misconceptions that I corrected.
S.C.
No it isn’t. What is always necessary is that justice is served. Justice may only be served in certain situations if the judge is also the jury. This occurs when the ideas of that judge and juror is more moral than the ideas of a group of people who would otherwise have been judge and jury separately.
This is of course no use at all in designing a system or set of rules. But it is also a non sequitur. It assumes that the outcome of a law case is one judgment by one agent in one role, so that we get the best result by having the best agent decide. But that is a wrong view of a law case. It is a set of judgments by a set of agents, each with different priorities and roles.
“If and when the presumption of innocence has been overcome by evidence proving beyond a reasonable doubt that the accused is guilty of the crime charged, then it is the sworn duty of the jury to enforce the law and to render a guilty verdict” – Jury Instructions Connecticut See State v. DelValle, 250 Conn. 466, 473 n.10 (1999) (encouraging use of this language to deter jury nullification).
You are always disobeying jury instructions when nullifying a verdict. Once again the liberty crowd comes up with a solution that is unrealistic.
It is the “sworn duty of the jury to enforce the law.”
“It is the “sworn duty of the jury to enforce the law.””
You’re ignoring Natural Law from which all legal systems must derive their legitimacy.
Or, as the Declaration of Independence worded it:
“… to secure these [Creator-endowed, and therefore logically prior to legalese] rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed …”
Or Frederic Bastiat:
“Force has been given to us to defend our own individual rights. Who will dare to say that force has been given to us to destroy the equal rights of our brothers? Since no individual acting separately can lawfully use force to destroy the rights of others, does it not logically follow that the same principle also applies to the common force that is nothing more than the organized combination of the individual forces?”
When the law violates individual liberty, it isn’t legitimate law.
Sadly it is all too realistic. Southern lynchers relied heavily and successfully on nullification. But you are right about a key point. They are advocating systematic duplicity. Does that encourage you to trust their ideas of how society should be run?
Delphin wrote:
“They are advocating systematic duplicity.”
I don’t know who the “they” is, but I’m not. I would not lie in order to get on a jury.
Bob, would you refuse to take an oath saying you’ll judge the innocence or guilt of the person on the facts of the case?
I would have to think about it if/when it becomes a real issue, but I once heard a sermon in which the pastor told us that even if you are called to testify, you shouldn’t take an oath (there is at least one Bible verse on this). And he said if you explain your concerns to the judge, s/he might let you go ahead without swearing on a Bible etc. if that’s not something you want to do. Instead you can just affirm that what you are going to say is the truth.
OK, but whether it’s an oath or affirmation, would you make the statement that you’ll judge the innocence or guilt of a person based on the facts of the case?
I would first do some research Keshav to see what that statement means. If it turns out I could only get on the jury through deception, then no I wouldn’t do that.
Quakers swear no oaths for that reason.
“They” are advocates of jurors violating oaths, or lieing to get on a jury. Since jury nullification in nearly every state (I believe in every state) requires one or the the other, that covers most nullification advocates.
Delphin, the empty square next to your comments is well suited for a straight razor
Exactly! If southern lynhers used jury nullification, then all jury nullification is by nature used to further unjust ends.
Delphin, I agree. I don’t think we should trust ideas based on the content of those ideas; we should determine whether those ideas are right or wrong based on the character of those who present them.
‘In my opinion, many libertarians’ understanding of law and politics is just surreal and wonky. Medieval Iceland as proto-ancap? Marriage as a contract? Pollution as trespass? Reducing all of law to property and contracts? Tragedy of the commons as a reason for privatization? The “free market” can “provide law”? These ideas are more than a little strange.’
All of those things seem perfectly sane and reasonable to me