The Surprising Views of Montesquieu and Tocqueville about Juries: Juries Empower Judges

• Author: Renée Lettow Lerner
• Position: Donald Phillip Rothschild Research Professor of Law, George Washington University
• Pages: 1-55

Louisiana Law Review Louisiana Law Review

Volume 81

Number 1

Fall 2020

Article 6

12-11-2020

The Surprising Views of Montesquieu and Tocqueville about The Surprising Views of Montesquieu and Tocqueville about

Juries: Juries Empower Judges Juries: Juries Empower Judges

Renée Lettow Lerner

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Repository Citation Repository Citation

Renée Lettow Lerner,

The Surprising Views of Montesquieu and Tocqueville about Juries: Juries Empower

Judges

, 81 La. L. Rev. (2020)

Available at: https://digitalcommons.law.lsu.edu/lalrev/vol81/iss1/6

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The Surprising Views of Montesquieu and

Tocqueville about Juries: Juries Empower Judges

Renée Lettow Lerner*1

ABSTRACT

Both Montesquieu and Tocqueville thought that an independent

judiciary was key to maintaining a moderate government of ordered

liberty. But judicial power should not be exercised too openly, or the

people would view judges as tyrannical. In Montesquieu’s and

Tocqueville’s view, the jury was an excellent mask for the power of

judges. Both Montesquieu and Tocqueville thought that popular juries had

many weaknesses in deciding cases. But, as Tocqueville made clear, the

firm guidance of the judge in instructions on law and comments on

evidence could prevent juries from going astray and make the institution a

“free school” for democracy.

The Article explores Montesquieu’s legacy concerning judges and

juries in the arguments of both the Federalists and the Anti-Federalists. It

also examines the American antecedents of Tocqueville’s idea of the jury

as a school for democracy.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction...................................................................................... 2

I. Montesquieu on Judges and Juries................................................... 7

A. Montesquieu’s Position as a Judge,

His Stay in England, and Spirit of the Laws .............................. 7

B. Professional Judges: The Key to Preserving Liberty............... 11

Copyright 2020, by RENÉE LETTOW LERNER.

* Donald Phillip Rothschild Research Professor of Law, George

Washington University. I am grateful for the comments of Donald Braman, Paul

Carrese, Bradford Clark, Robert Cottrol, Peter Hansen, John Harper, Dmitry

Karshtedt, Amalia Kessler, Cynthia Lee, Craig Lerner, Manuel Lopez, Nelson

Lund, Hank Molinengo, Sean Murphy, Richard Pierce, Edward Swaine, and

Arthur Wilmarth. Karen Wahl provided expert library assistance, at a time when

many libraries were closed.

1. This Article is intended mainly for an English-speaking audience, and so,

wherever possible, I use sources in English. Fortunately, many of the m ajor works

of French scholarship concerning Montesquieu and Tocqueville have been

translated into English.

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2 LOUISIANA LAW REVIEW [Vol. 81

C. Problems with Lay Juries......................................................... 12

D. Advantages of Lay Juries......................................................... 15

E. English Judges’ Control over Juries ........................................ 19

F. Montesquieu among the American Founders:

The Anti-Federalists and Hamilton

on Judges and Juries ................................................................ 23

II. Tocqueville on Judges and Juries................................................... 30

A. Tocqueville’s Judicial Career, Travels in America,

and Democracy in America ..................................................... 31

B. Tocqueville on the American Legal Profession....................... 35

C. Tocqueville on the Jury as a Judicial Institution...................... 38

D. Tocqueville on the Jury as a Political Institution:

“A Free School”....................................................................... 40

1 Tocqueville’s Similarity to Montesquieu,

and His New Idea.............................................................. 40

2. American Antecedents for the Idea of the

Jury as a School................................................................. 42

3. The Judge as Teacher and Firm Guide.............................. 46

E. American Transformation of Tocqueville’s Idea..................... 50

Conclusion...................................................................................... 52

INTRODUCTION

We American legal professionals think we know about Montesquieu

and Tocqueville. Or, at least, we think we know enough. Montesquieu

developed the three-fold separation of powers embodied in the structure

of the U.S. Constitution and the federal government.2 He also supported

use of lay juries.3 Tocqueville wrote that the jury is a school for

democracy.4 He also quipped that, in America, sooner or later, almost

every political question becomes a judicial question.5 The vast majority of

us stop there and call it a day, without bothering actually to read them, or,

if we do, only in tiny, isolated, and easily digested snippets.

2. CHARLES DE SECONDAT, BARON DE MONTESQUIEU, THE SPIRIT OF THE

LAWS 156–57 (bk. 11, ch. 6) (Anne M. Cohler, Basia Carolyn Miller & Harold

Samuel Stone trans. & eds., 1989) (1748).

3. Id. at 158.

4. 1 ALEXIS DE TOCQUEVILLE, DE MOCRACY IN AMERICA 275 (J.P. Mayer

ed., George Lawrence trans., 1969) (1835).

5. Id. at 270.