Word: burger
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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Chief Justice Warren Burger has publicly blamed the press accounts of the Gannett case for the confusion in the lower courts. But his colleagues on the high court disagree over the meaning of the decision, which some court watchers say was carelessly written in the court's rush to dispose of its case load before the summer recess. Though it is unusual for Supreme Court Justices to explain their judicial opinions publicly, so far four have. Burger told reporters last month that the Gannett decision is limited to pretrial hearings. Justice Harry Blackmun, who dissented in the case, told...
...reason is complex, but essential to understanding Gannett. In a separate opinion handed down with the decision, Burger emphasized that the Gannett case involved only a pretrial hearing, not a trial. Since Burger's vote to allow judges to close off pretrial hearings was decisive in making up the court's five-man majority, his opinion should limit the scope of the decision. The confusion arises from some broad language in the majority opinion, written by Justice Potter Stewart and signed by four other Justices, including Burger. It flatly states that members of the public have no constitutional...
...refused to allow jury trials, using as an excuse a lone footnote in a 1970 Supreme Court decision suggesting that the Seventh Amendment right to a jury may be limited by "the practical abilities and limitations" of jurors. But earlier this month U.S. Supreme court Chief Justice Warren Burger joined a growing number of bench and bar leaders who question whether modern juries can understand, much less fairly decide, complex, protracted cases...
...jury actually selected [for a big case] is rarely a true cross section," said Burger in a speech to state chief justices. "Overwhelmingly, a great many of the people best qualified to sit on juries are those most eager to escape jury duty." Usually they succeed. With excuses ranging from "bad sleeping habits" to "poor frame of mind," every potential juror who did not want to sit through the Memorex case was excused. There were 118 in all. In many long cases, anyone who cannot get away from work for months at a time or who earns more than jury...
...Eliminate juries in civil trials that are too long and too complicated for laymen. At the Conference of State Chief Justices last week, Chief Justice Burger strongly urged judges to consider this proposal, pointing out that it can take "not hours, but days" for the judge to explain the legal issues to jurors, who then cannot always be expected to understand or remember what the judge said. Burger noted that Britain, which has less delay in its courts than the U.S., has successfully abolished juries in most civil cases...