Popular Justice and the Lay Magistracy - The Two Faces of Lay Participation (From Essays in Law and Society, P 73-94, 1980, Zenon Bankowski and Geoff Mungham, ed. - See NCJ-73690)

• NCJ Number: 73695
• Author(s): R Pearson
• Date Published: 1980
• Length: 22 pages
• Sale Source: Routledge and Kegan Paul Ltd
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

The principal characteristics of lay magistrates in England and Wales are reviewed, and the long-term implications of increased working-class involvement on the bench is discussed. A study to determine working-class magistrate's attitudes, as distinguishable from those of other magistrates, is reviewed.

Abstract

Judicial systems produced by differing societies can be classified into four major types: the hunter-gatherer society in which law keeping focuses on justice and involves the entire community; feudal society where the land-owning minority imposes controls; a society which has a system of legal justice dominated by rules and institutions; and popular justice (socialist countries) in which all proceedings are public and informal. The lay magistry of England and Wales functions within the orbit of formal legal justice, but it reflects its precapitalist origins in its unpaid and untrained staff, the exercise of discretion by magistrates, and the few democratic elements in the selection process. This study researched the operations of a lay magistrates' benches for 2 years and found no more than 10 unskilled or semiskilled workers out of 140 magistrates. Interviews with these individuals revealed that working-class magistrates had certain attitudes which set them apart from the majority of magistrates, such as a belief in a stiff first sentence as a deterrent and a skeptical view of police behavior and evidence. The small proportion of working-class magistrates can be attributed to a secret selection process largely based on political influence. Once selected, magistrates are carefully socialized into performing specific tasks in an institutional manner by a training course which emphasizes procedures and the attitudes of more experienced judges. The centralization of health and welfare services has robbed magistrates of many powers, placed stricter controls over their sentencing policies, and forced the bench to cooperate with other agencies. Many magistrates are frustrated by the large amounts of time demanded by an overworked bench and challenges to their authority by the increasing numbers of professionals who appear in court. A bibliography of 39 references is included.