Should
corporations be entitled to have corporate jurors on their jury? Typically, people accused of wrongful
acts—whether criminal or tortious—have a right to a trial by a jury of their
peers. But, corporations are not people.
Yet, corporations are often sued for their misconduct. So, how can a corporation be given a jury of
its peers?
Corporations
are legal fictions created by statute.
Corporations are treated as “artificial persons” that have a lot of the
same rights as individuals—this is called “corporate personhood.” For more in depth discussion click here. The idea behind corporate personhood is that
corporations are owned and controlled by people and speak through their
officers—who are people—thus corporations should be afforded the same rights as
people. Corporations are even afforded
similar constitutional rights under the U.S. Constitution—which includes the
right to a trial by jury of its peers.
But, corporations
are not receiving a trial of its peers. A corporation’s peers are other legal
fictions, not people that sit in a jury box when the corporation is being sued. Albeit, the jurors deciding the corporation’s
fate could be officers of corporations, but that is not likely.
Corporations
should receive a jury of its peers because it increases fairness. There are vast numbers of articles
challenging the fairness of defendants not receiving a jury of its peers. The primary example is when racial minorities
have juries that are completely or almost completely white. Advocates for justice claim this is not
fair—especially in jurisdictions where the racial minority outnumbers whites.
There are two
ways in which a corporation could be provided a trial of its peers. First, corporations could be treated as
people in a general sense and be served summons in all types of cases. In this scenario, corporations would be
treated no differently than people.
Corporation would be able to receive juror summons and would have to
report for jury duty. Of course,
corporations cannot report for jury duty, so the corporation would have to act
through its officers. Thus, its officers
would have to report for jury duty. This
scenario would particularly attractive in tort claims where a person brings
suit against a corporation. Ideally, the
jury would consist of both regular people and corporations—really officers of
the corporation. But, this is a broad
scenario and would be quite difficult to implement.
Second,
corporations could sit on juries for very specified cases like breach of
contract between two corporations.
Again, corporations are unable to sit on juries, so the jury would
consist of officers from different corporations. Because both parties in the lawsuit are
corporations, it would make sense that every juror be a corporation—because a
corporation’s peers are other corporations.
So, corporations
should be afforded a jury of its peers because it would increase fairness for
corporations. The U.S. Constitution
affords individuals the right to a trial of his or her peers. Why should corporations not be afforded the
same?
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