One is
that if the jury is to judge of the law, you will have as
many different laws as you have juries. There is no revision
of their conclusion. They are not obliged to tell, and there
is no way in which the court can know, what their opinion
was. So a man tried on one side of the court-house may be
held guilty, and another man tried on the other side of the
court-house may be held innocent for precisely the same act.
The other reason is that the court must always decide what
evidence shall be admitted. So if the jury are to be the
judges of the law, one authority must determine what evidence
they shall consider, and another determine what law shall
be applied to it. For instance, suppose a defendant charged
with homicide offers to prove certain facts which as he claims
justify the killing. The Judge says these facts do not, under
the law, justify the killing and excludes the evidence. That
may be the real point in the case, and the jury may believe
that those facts fully justify the homicide; still they cannot
be permitted to hear them. It is preposterous to suppose
that so logical and reasonable a system as the Common Law
could ever have tolerated such an absurdity.
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