Hamlin v. State
| Decision Date | 21 June 1887 |
| Citation | 10 A. 214,67 Md. 333 |
| Parties | HAMLIN AND ANOTHER v. STATE. [1] |
| Court | Maryland Court of Appeals |
Appeal from criminal court of Baltimore.
T C. Ruddell, for appellants.
Atty. Gen. Roberts, for appellee.
The appellants, who were two of the judges of election in the Sixth precinct of the Eighteenth ward of the city of Baltimore at the congressional election in November, 1886 were indicted for violating the election laws. The indictment contains two counts. The first charges that they willfully and knowingly received an illegal vote at that election; and the second that they unlawfully, willfully, and fraudulently certified to the grand jury that they did not know, and had no means to believe, that any violation of the election laws had been committed at said election, whereas, in truth and in fact, a large number of illegal votes had been cast at said election, in violation of said laws, as they then and there well knew. They first demurred to the indictment; which demurrer the court overruled. They then moved for a severance, and this motion the court granted; but on the same day they withdrew this motion, and pleaded non cul. Upon this plea they were tried together, and the jury rendered a verdict of "guilty."
At the trial a single exception was taken. It appears that when the lists of twenty jurors were furnished to the state's attorney, and to counsel for the traversers, for each side to strike four names therefrom, the latter claimed the right to strike eight names,--that is to say, four for each traverser,--but the court refused to allow them to do so, and to this ruling they excepted. The question thus raised though novel in this court, is entirely free from difficulty. The law upon the subject is very plain. In "all civil cases" tried before a jury, and also "in all criminal cases where the right of peremptory challenge is not allowed," (as it clearly is not in this, the punishment being neither death nor confinement in the penitentiary,) it is provided that twenty persons from the panel of petit jurors shall be drawn by ballot by the clerk, under the direction of the court, and the names of these twenty shall be written upon two lists, and one of said lists shall be forthwith delivered "to the respective parties or their counsel in the cause, and the said parties or their counsel may each strike out four persons from the said lists, and the remaining twelve persons shall be immediately impaneled and sworn as the petit jury in such cause." Code, art. 50, §§ 9, 13. And this has been the law of the state ever since Acts 1797, c. 87, § 9; 1802, c. 69; and 1809, c. 138, § 14. The language is that the "respective parties or their counsel may each" do this; not that every or any person may do it. The cause is one, and there are two parties to it. All who are joined as plaintiffs constitute "one party," and all who are joined as defendants the other. In other words, the two parties to a cause are regarded each as an integral unit, whether consisting of one or several persons. Such is not only the obviously true construction of the language thus used, but it has been sanctioned by the uniform and universal practice of the courts ever since the statutes were passed. In fact, the whole panel of petit jurors for each term consists of only twenty-five; so that, if each individual plaintiff and defendant has the right to strike four out of the list of twenty, it would necessitate the summoning of talesmen in nearly...
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