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Ladies and gentlemen number one wisely is bringing you periodic lay programs and speakers of this thing speakers who are representative authorities in their respective fields and now we take you to the city hall where the voice of the chairman will be heard in food using a featured speaker ladies and gentlemen of the radio audience it is the rare privilege of this series to bring to you today the wisdom experience and advice of one who above all of those needs no introduction this is in the series of addresses arranged by the county clerk Archibald R. Watson upon the jury system its history its importance and the civic duty of jury service and you are about to hear the voice of one not unfamiliar to those who live in this great city whose name and personality are likewise recognized throughout the nation a public officer who has brought only honor and credit to the high office which he occupies and who though still inspired by the dynamic third of youth has already given many years of a useful eventful and unselfish life to the service of his fellow citizens by this description you have already recognized the band who was about to address you and you would I am sure be impatient for this introduction to be prolonged but you will allow one sentence more of him you are about to hear it has been justly said that he has as high a conception of public duty as wide a range of talent sympathies interest and emotions as any man in public life today he takes as his special topic what kind of juries do we want Ladies and gentlemen the distinguished mayor of the city of New York is on a peer L A H Lagarde. I appreciate the privilege of being able to talk to you Gary first of. I hope you are listening to the instructive and interesting and pressures arranged for you by our county clerk I can borrow Watson learned about grand juries from presiding justice marking of the appellate division about the trial jury from there to turn a town or city delay about the value of the jury system from Colonel Ware QUESTION May I remark here that the selection of a man of the type of Mr Watson is counted. Justified our efforts in the past to have such a position filled by appointment rather than by a like a political job has been transformed into a public office. There is a great need for the people of our city to become more active in the workings of our government particularly in serving on juries and in the queening themselves with the way the jury system works and there are people who are still confused about the difference between a during a criminal case and in a civil case I heard the other day a violent jury which rendered its wording after a trial of a negligence action to automobiles had collided and the owner of the chad sued the other for damages in court two suits came up in the one case a civil case with what we call a card a claim by the offended to the plaintiffs complaint the foreman announced the verdict of the curious follow your honor we find the plaintiff and of the phantom not guilty and that they should both be here quit this could not have happened if the jurors were even slightly familiar with their duty All right I may be permitted to say so to vote yet if the court had intelligently challenge the killing. Inscribed across the Potomac of the Supreme Court building at the famous words from Washington's farewell address through administration of justice is the firmest color of good government one of the most vital factors in the administration of justice is the maintenance of juries composed of our pry reasonable intelligent men and women. From all walks of life without such people on juries it would be futile to arraign and cry before the bar of justice those who see fit to make a living from crime without them the numerous disputant conflicts there are bound to arrive with the best will in the world among people living together and engaged in business cannot be resolved and would expand and multiply so little friction and even endanger the security in which we are there some method must exist for resolving these numerous this field getting them before a judge and jury having both sides made to Edith station and having bull leave the court room with the dispute ended any feeling that in the main justice has been done throughout the long experience of mankind no by a better way has been found to or arrive at the truth in a contested issue of fact and the verdict of the jury day until all cases the people of this state have come to believe that in this station by five six and a civil jury is of sufficient force and validity to be accepted as final. Despite all the attempts of science to lie detectors and other instruments to get at the truth most of us feel as our district attorney has stated previously that the jury is the best lie detector of them all it is only a jury composed of men and women with common sense which can discount the inflated claims of both sides to dispute and arrive somewhere near the actual fact is a jury from normal day the human experience which can generally pierce through the glibness seven a big part of the fire which can give proper weight to the upward recitals of timid people abashed by the atmosphere of the court room which can deflate the enthusiastic utterances are always jealous counsel and which can ascertain when the witnesses are honestly mistaken in the version they render of particular facts it is a proper jury which can see through a false alibi and which can pass a judgment on a nationwide energy of participants in an alleged crime it is a jury which can draw from its own experience in a workaday world properly inferences from a series of acts as to presence or absence of criminal intent and one accused of wrongdoing when such a jury agrees on a verdict we can generally be certain that in each case care has been separated from the weak and that justice rough though it may be has been done another great function and value of the jury in our scheme of things has often been overlooked when someone has been accused of a crime although he may possibly be innocent a machine rarely been set in motion which often seems like a juggernaut really length of play for showing its way and cracking to crush the accused the entire power of our own eyes of government is behind it form an indictment the very title of the case suggest that there is apparently an equal combat between the puny individual and the majesty of the state. People of the state of New York against John Doe or the United States of America against John Doe against possible of caged all mistaken charges brought against accused persons the jury remains the only buffer between the shame of conviction and the daylight of freedom to which innocent citizens are entitled It is only the it is the only protection within the reach of everyone against their arbitrary excesses of the abuse of power when we consider the tremendous resources at the disposal of the state and its relation to indictments against individuals we should cherish and crater the maintenance of an unimpaired jury system as keenly necessary buffer between the government and the individual on the other hand is the best system conceived today to prevent a court from individual inclination the influence of politics or otherwise admitting a criminal to escape justice the institution of trial by jury has been with us for about six hundred years it would not have endured its length of time if it were not released for it and a fundamental approval by the people of the value as a means of resolving disputes and that attaining guilt or innocence we must avoid the danger of having such an instrument important their statement of our daily life to come rushing an innovation through public indifference and general shirking of the duty that goes with the right of trial by jury the germ of the idea of jury trial and brought into England at the time of the Norman conquest in the eleventh century in essence at that time it was the summoning of a body of neighbors by a public object to give an answer under oath on some question of fact a lot at the outset the object of the inquiry were to obtain information for the king usually to add pain facts required an assessment at the thing taxation. The Anglo-Saxon Saxton custom of or law of the time to prove guilt or innocence with either trial by combat the ordeal or complication that is someone accused of a crime could prove his innocence by having a picture battle of his if he won he was innocent people are willing or he could stick his hand to boiling water and hold it there for a while if it came out skated he was eligible otherwise built or he could get a large number of people to swear that he could not have committed the crime a larger number than the number of witnesses brought by his accusers that system hasn't been lost in time and it took quite a long time before the jury system as we know it today was finally if that happened one of the great elements for the security that they say this on this country feels is the deep conviction that no matter who may be in power no matter what faces charges will be made against them he will always have the right and the up to ninety two witnesses whom he caught the stand to explain his actions to a jury of his fellow man and that's me the case presented against him and vindicate his innocence by the same token. Charge of the responsibility of law enforcement have the assurance that still isn't serving on a jury as the as he is to protect their own community and home well not hesitate to bring in a just verdict the jury system functions smoothly only if men of intelligence and character male always be found in these Joy OK just may or current when this is not the case then we have the possibility of a miscarriage of justice whether in the conviction of an innocent band or the an acquittal of a guilty one or another fair and unjust verdict in a film OK jury duty is one of the most important duty of the citizens of a democracy have to render. The general idea of the court is a place where two people are scrapped but living Asian affects everybody and there is nothing that is more conducive to loss of confidence in government and an improper and unjust decision of a court. The great danger we face is in that of having the proper type of jurors because so many people who are properly qualified to hesitate about refuse or dodge jury duty in some cases people have complained of professional George who are satisfied merely to park at their jury to be searched jurors become callous and indifferent to the right of the parties to win its appeal. What we want in the community bar twelve men or women ranged from their own daily experience and caring just connected with the thought atmosphere and procedure to this side the case on the merits we want active business men and women professional people and wage earners we do not want the one merely seeking the three dollars per day we do not want the men recommended by the politicians from the different club nor do we want the politicians to use their efforts in getting men and women of all from jury service getting on a jury to political employment for three dollars a day are getting awfully Knowlton note from a political leader are equally bad if any businessman a woman really find it difficult to serve on a jury at a particular time he will find the judge presiding at reasonable question and opportunity will be given to serve the following month or the month after that we must not allow our curate boxes to be filled with shiftless people just because the business man or woman is too busy with his private affairs destroyed it. It is higher leaders are about to have a fresh supply of time are properly qualified your own show that the jurors themselves should not from long service in court get into a state of mind with a relatively thick to deal point toward clouds like that held by a person identified with the courtroom it was to overcome fear factor specialized judicial have it killed that juries were sought as a protection for litigant judges judges have their powerful place in expounding the law jurymen are not required to be expert they should we look at nor should we like to see them become expert in judicial procedure we should like to have them always close to the need to Cyrus settlement mood and attitude of the people at large in the community so that they can bring to the problems before them a cost section of the best type of approach from their knowledge of life and living conditions we can have such juries by a large and frequent turnover in our jury panel the ideal would be every man made your Each one of us must realize that if he hears and different to the type of Persians making up a jury and is willing to allow someone else to serve in this place he may find themselves from being confronted with a jury enough to his liking for it which is really others own making every telephone have those much differently excused to disqualified by the law have a duty to respond and to spend economic conditions social position creed or color are factors that do not and curate that enter into the method after like to delete them. That's not if there are them by now somewhere in there if it is to be fifty dollars it is only by the active participation in it of the citizens of this community democracy is not something handed to us ready made it is something we ourselves made without own effort it is tool voting out political activity generally and it is doubly cruel of the jury system you must not allow this important instrument for obtaining get it to become warped and weak through neglect if you permit this one important part of democracy to come but it will be becoming easier to have our liberties in other respects whittled away we might be better vigilant to guard the altar and this of this liberty as of all that we can do so only by participating actively in the day to day workings of our democratic system by gladly accepting the privilege of honorable service in helping to administer justice in this way only can we put their heritage and tradition of liberty and justice under the Law Thank you Mr Mayor in the enlightening address which you have just heard it has been the privilege of this series to bring to you the wisdom experience and advice to the mayor of the city of New York sitting at his desk at city hall Mayor Lagarde years address was one of the theories arranged by a county clerk Archibald are watching upon the jury system its history its importance and the civic duty of jury service next Wednesday at six P.M. You will hear upon other phases of the same subject general assertions of Judge John J.. They didn't gentleman maybe call your attention to some of the highlights featured over your own city station W N Y D to be heard the evening at six forty five P.M. Dr Edward S. got to be the date the patient and the doctor at seven P.M. the masterwork hour and at eight thirty to nine thirty P.M. from the wild eyed story of the one hundred thirty second annual meeting of the Medical Society of the state of New York May we remark or good music or outstanding educational civic programs keep human to eight ten your own city state and we now return you to our studios this is the municipal Broadcasting System.