904 Slide – American State Trials 1918 Volume X Leo Frank Document

964 XY. AMERICAN STATE TRIALS.

as the task may be, I shall offer a few observations to show
that they have this right. I intend to defend Mr. Callender
by the establishment of two points.

First, that a law contrary to the Constitution is void; and,
secondly, that the jury have a right to consider the law and
the fact. First, it seems to be admitted on all hands, that,
when the legislature exercise a power not given them by the
Constitution, the judiciary will disregard their acts. The
second point, that the jury have a right to decide the law
and the fact, appears to me equally clear. In the exercise of
the power of determining law and fact, a jury cannot be
controlled by the court. The court have a right to instrnet
the jury, but the jury have a right to act as they think right;
and if they find contrary to the directions of the court, and
to the law of the case, the court may set aside their verdict
and grant 4 new trial.

Jouvep Case. Courts do not claim the right of setting
aside the verdict in criminal cases.

Mr, Nicholas. From this right of the jury to consider law
and fact in a general verdict, it seems to follow, that counsel
ought to be permitted to address a jury on the constitutional-
ity of the law in question; this leads me back to my first
position, that if an set of Congress contravene the Constitu-
tion of the United States, a jury have a right to say that it is
null, and that they will not give the efficacy of a law to an
act which is void in itself; believing it to be contrary to the
Constitution, they will not convict any man of a violation
of it, If this jury believed that the Sedition Act is not a
law of the land, they cannot find the defendant guilty. The
Constitution secures to every man a fair and impartial trial
by jury, in the district where the fact shall have been com-
mitted: and to preserve this sacred right unimpaired, it
should never be interfered with. If ever a precedent is es-
tablished, that the court ean control the jury so as to prevent
them from finding a general verdict, their important right,
without which every other right is of no value, will be m-
paired, if not absolutely destroyed. Juries are to decide ac-