If the government had no alternative but to execute all judgments of a jury indiscriminately, the power of juries would unquestionably be dangerous; for there is no doubt that they may sometimes give hasty and erroneous judgments.
Lysander Spooner
The Public Record
Lysander Spooner was an American abolitionist, entrepreneur, lawyer, essayist, natural rights legal theorist, pamphleteer, political philosopher, and writer often associated with the Boston anarchist tradition.
gutenberg.org
In such cases, the principle of Magna Carta unquestionably is, that the uniform judgments of successivejuries shall prevail over the opinion of the court.
It is hardly possible that any other cause should be adequate to produce such an effect; because justice comes very near to being a self-evident principle.
If, in addition to this, the court be uniformly on the side of justice, it is not a reasonable supposition that a succession of juries should disagree about it.
If, therefore, a succession of juries do disagree on the law of any case, the presumption is, not that justice fails of being done, but that injustice is prevented that injustice, which would be done, if the opinion of the court were…
If it be asked what provision the trial by jury makes for such cases, the answer is, it makes none; and justice must fail of being done, from the want of its being made sufficiently intelligible.
That, in civil cases, possession is presumptive proof of property; or, in other words, every man is presumed to be the rightful proprietor of whatever he has in his possession.
That these presumptions shall be overcome, in a court of justice, only by evidence, the sufficiency of which, and by law, the justice of which, are satisfactory to the under- standing and consciences of all the jurors.
These are the bases on which the trial by jury places the property, liberty, and rights of every individual.
Admitting, for the sake of the argument, that this may be true, the compensation for it is, that positive injustice will also often fail to be done; whereas otherwise it would be done frequently.
The very precautions used to prevent injustice being done, may often have the effect to prevent justice being done.
If the authority be vested in the government, the governmnt is absolute, and the people have no liberties except such as the government sees fit to indulge them with.