The Short ConstitutionWade, Martin J. (Martin Joseph)
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The Short Constitution
Wade, Martin J. (Martin Joseph)
United States. Constitution
Of course there is often more or less controversy about property of small
value, where the expense and delay of jury trials might possibly be
oppressive, but in any case involving more than twenty dollars in value,
triable under the common law, which includes practically all cases except
those peculiar cases triable in Chancery, or in Courts of Equity, the
parties are entitled to a trial by jury. That is, instead of introducing
their evidence and having the judge decide what the truth is between them,
the parties are entitled to have a jury of men from the ordinary
occupations of life hear the evidence and say from the evidence what is
the truth.
And furthermore, the people provided in the Constitution that:
“_No fact tried by a jury shall be otherwise re-examined in any Court of
the United States, than according to the rules of the common law._”(72)
Here again is the right to a jury trial, and the benefit of a jury trial,
and to a trial according to the established rules and precedents of the
common law courts carefully preserved.
Now my friends, I know that there is much confusion in your minds about
trials in court. I do not expect you to know all about trials. We are
studying the guaranties of the Constitution so that we shall learn human
rights—our rights—under the Constitution. I am talking to you about the
safeguards of the Constitution so you shall know your rights, especially
so that you will always venerate the Constitution which guards your
rights, and defend it against those who may assail it. But I do want you
to have a clear idea of what a trial in court is. I want you to know the
purpose of the long days of examination of witnesses, the objections of
the attorneys to certain questions asked, the rulings of the court, and
the arguments of counsel.
_The main purpose, aim, and object of every lawsuit_, as trials are
usually termed by people who are not lawyers, _is to find the truth_. The
proceedings in court in every lawsuit are a continuous search for the
truth. If in disputes we could agree to what the truth is, there would be
few lawsuits to try.
A lawsuit only arises where there is a dispute to settle. If people agreed
about their rights there would be little need of courts. In criminal
cases, the government through the grand jury charges by indictment that a
man committed a certain crime. The government says the man did it. He
denies it by a plea of not guilty. He says he did not. The trial before
the petit jury is merely a search for the truth about the charge. _What is
the truth about the matter in dispute_, that is all that is involved in an
ordinary lawsuit.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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