Can you imagine a trial judge intentionally misinforming a jury as to its responsibilities and actions in a pending court case? Can you imagine a judge doing so, such that the jury would act to convict a defendant whom they might otherwise have acquitted?

You would probably feel no small amount of outrage toward that judge.

Well, guess what! Such misinformation is given to jurors as a matter of routine in every state in this union. In fact, the standard instructions given to juries here in Louisiana, by the trial judges, read as follows:

3.01 Duty to Follow Law as Instructed

"It is now my duty to instruct you on the law that applies to your deliberations. It is your duty to follow these instructions in reaching your verdict. Although you are the sole judges of the law and the facts on the question of guilt or innocence, you have the duty to accept and apply the law as given by the court. You must decide the facts from the testimony and other evidence and apply the law to those facts in reaching your verdict.

You must not single out any of these instructions and disregard others."
hat these instructions are saying, ladies and gentlemen, is that, no matter how unjust, unfair, preposterous, or ridiculous the law is that's being used against the defendant; and although the court readily agrees that "you are the sole judges of the law and the facts", you are bound by your duty (as defined by the judge) to rule only on guilt or innocence in accordance with the law.

DON'T.....YOU.....BELIEVE IT!

This is a lie! In fact, I would venture to say it is felony jury tampering!

Our legal system was set up SPECIFICALLY to allow a jury to sit in judgment of both the defendant AND the law!

John Jay, the first Chief Justice of the United States wrote: "The jury has the right to judge both the law as well as the fact in controversy." Another U.S. Supreme Court Justice, Oliver Wendell Holmes, stated, "The jury has the power to bring in a verdict in the teeth of both law and facts."

If that isn't enough, I'll allow another titan to wade in. Alexis de Tocqueville, in "Democracy in America" wrote that the jury's power, "places the real direction of society in the hands of the governed, and not in that of the government." Ah! If only it were so!

Well, back when our government was considerably less powerful, juries exercised their legal power of "nullification" over the law.

The Federal "Fugitive Slave Law" provided severe penalties for anyone convicted of harboring escaped slaves, and levied the charge of treason against anyone who refused to assist a government official in apprehending said slaves and their protectors. Juries quite frequently refused to convict the defendants, in spite of overwhelming evidence of their guilt. The people believed, quite rightly, that the law was unjust and thus they chose to refuse to convict a defendant of violating it. Imagine how those people would feel today. They would be forced, via misinformation handed them by the "impartial" judge to convict one of their peers for a crime which they would have committed themselves had they been in the same situation.

Indeed, there have been instances in modern times in which jurors went up to the defendant they had just convicted and, with tears in their eyes, apologized to the individual because they "had no choice."

There have been some "justices" who have openly defended the policy of misinforming juries because they fear that otherwise there would be no control over the law. Apparently they, like many other people in government, (including the Clintons and their cast of clowns), believe that we're all a bunch of ignorant bumpkins who would wreak havoc on ourselves and their precious enlightened notions if we were made aware of our power to nullify their stupid laws.

Once again a bunch of elitists in the government seek to ride herd over the general public “for our own good.”

Well, no thanks!

This nation was founded on the notion of self-government. If we can’t be trusted to govern ourselves, then what kind of political system do we have?

Fortunately, there are still people in this country who, when made aware of their rights as jurors, have the nerve to spit in the judge’s eye.

Some years ago a rancher in New Mexico was brought up on charges for illegally trapping and killing mountain lions on his property. He had lost 40% of his calves to the lions in one year and had to do something to save his livelihood.

There was no doubt in the minds of any of the parties concerned with the case that the man had killed at least two mountain lions. Nevertheless, the jury took all of 10 minutes to deliver a verdict of not guilty!

The decision stood! Indeed, as recently as 1972 a federal court ruled: “The jury has an unreviewable and unreversible power.....to acquit in disregard of the instruction of the law given by the trial judge.”

There you have it. Our tough, libertarian neighbors to the West stood up to the legal mandarins and retained control of their legal system. Now that we know what’s going on, will we do the same?