Is reasonable doubt reasonable?

Legal Theory

Volumn 9, Issue 4, 2003, Pages 295-331

  Laudan, Larry ^a  

^a UNIVERSIDAD NACIONAL AUTÓNOMA DE MÉXICO   (Mexico)

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EID: 85018383234     PISSN: 13523252     EISSN: 14698048     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1017/S1352325203000132     Document Type: Article

References (55)

1. McCue v. Commonwealth, 103 Va. 870 at 1002 (1905).
2. Jon. O. Newman, Beyond “Reasonable Doubt,” N.Y.U. L. REV. 979, 984 (1993).
3. Erik Lillquist, Recasting Reasonable Doubt: Decision Theory and the Virtues of Variability, U.C. DAVIS L. REV. 85, 190-191 (2002).
4. Commonwealth v. Webster, 59 Mass. 320 (1850).
5. Dunbar v. United States, 156 U.S. 185 (1894).
6. The Supreme Court itself, in Cage v. Louisiana, argued that In re Winship established that the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment “protects the accused against conviction except upon proof beyond a reasonable doubt of every fact necessary to constitute the crime with which he is charged”; Cage v. Louisiana, 498 U.S. 39 (1990). In dissent in In re Winship, Justice Black pointed out that “in two places the Constitution provides for trial by jury, but nowhere in that document is there any statement that conviction of crime requires proof of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt”; In Re Winship, 397 U.S. 358, at 383 (1970).
7. From Justice Blackmun's dissent in Victor v. Nebraska, 511 U.S. 1, 37 (1994).
8. Cf. N. Carolina v. Bryant, 432 S.E. 2d 291 (1993); and S. Carolina v. Manning, 409 S.E. 2d 372 (1991).
9. 5TH CIR. CRIM. JURY INSTR. 1.06 (1990).
10. Commonwealth v. Ferreira, 373 Mass. 116, 130 (1977). While I agree with the general sentiment expressed here, I do not understand why the Massachusetts court argued that guilty verdicts are “frequently irrevocable.” Given the near-ubiquity of judicial review of convictions, it would seem fairer to say that they are frequently not revoked.
11. In a landmark 1954 case, Holland v. United States, the Supreme Court approved the jury instruction described in the preceding section but added: “we think this section of the charge should have been in terms of the kind of doubt that would make a person hesitate to act rather than the kind on which he would be willing to act.” 348 U.S. 140 (1954).
12. Edward J. Devitt et al., FEDERAL JURY PRACTICE AND INSTRUCTIONS, §12.10, 354 (4th ed. 1987).
13. Federal Judicial Center, PATTERNCRIMINAL JURY INSTRUCTIONS 18-19 (1987) (commentary on instruction 21).
14. Quoted in 114 S. Ct. at 1244. The careful reader will note that the California language is lifted almost verbatim from Justice Shaw's instruction of 1850.
15. Burnett v. Nebraska, 86 Neb. 11 (1910).
16. Carr v. Nebraska, 23 Neb. 749, 750 (1888).
17. Young v. Oklahoma, 1962 OK CR 70 (1962).
18. Morgan v. Ohio, 48 Ohio St. 371, 376 (1891).
19. Pennsylvania v. Dauphinee, 121 Pa. Super. 565, 590 (1936). My italics.
20. Pennsylvania v. Baker, 93 Pa. Super 360 (1928).
21. U.S. v. Davis, 328 F.2d 864, 867 (1964).
22. Iowa v. Cohen, 108 Iowa 208, 214 (1899).
23. Siberry v. Indiana, 133 Ind. 677, 685 (1893).
24. Butler v. Wisconsin, 102 Wis. 364 (1899).
25. Massachusetts v. Sullivan, 482 N.E.2d 1198 (1985).
26. McCulloch v. Nevada, 99 Nev. 72, 75 (1983).
27. From the dissent of Blackmun and Souter in Victor, 511 U.S. 1 (1994).
28. Brennan wrote: “It is critical that the moral force of the criminal law not be diluted by a standard of proof that leaves people in doubt whether innocent men are being condemned. It is also important in our free society that every individual going about his ordinary affairs have confidence that his government cannot adjudge him guilty of a criminal offense without convincing a proper fact finder of his guilt with utmost certainty”; In re Winship, 397 U.S. 358, at 364 (1970). According to a LexisNexis search, no fewer than fifty-three other appellate rulings since 1970 quote and endorse this incoherent sentiment of Brennan's.
29. Daniel Shaviro, Statistical-Probability Evidence and the Appearance of Justice, 105 HARVARD L REV 531 (1989).
30. Thomas Starkie, TREATISE ON EVIDENCE, 507 (1824).
31. Cohen and Christensen, 1970, p. 62.
32. Laurence Tribe, Trial by Mathematics, 84 Harv. L. Rev. 1329, 1379 (1970).
33. The case establishing that any explanation of reasonable doubt is a reversible error in Oklahoma is Pannell v. Oklahoma, 640 P.2d 568, 570 (1982). For Wyoming's similar rule, see Cosco v. Wyoming, 521 P.2d 1345, 1346 (1974).
34. U.S. v. Martin-Tregora, 684 F.2d 485, 493 (7th Cir. 1982).
35. U.S. v. Hall, 854 F.2d 1036, 1039 (7th Cir. 1988). The shifting reactions of appellate courts to the use of BARD instructions are discussed in detail in Jessica Cohen, The Reasonable Doubt Jury Instruction: Giving Meaning to a Critical Concept, 22 AM. J. CRIM. L. 677 (1995).
36. U.S. v. Glass, 846 F.2d 386 (1988).
37. Smith v. Butler, 696 F. Supp. 748, 765 (1988).
38. Anonymous Note, Reasonable Doubt: An Argument Against Definition, 108 HARV. L. REV. 1955, 1965 (1995).
39. See U.S. v. Reives, 114 S. Ct. 2679 (1994).
40. Victor, 114 S. Ct. at 1243 (1994).
41. U.S. v. Lawson 507 F.2d 433, 422 (7th Cir. 1974).
42. Geoffrey Kramer & Doorean Koenig, Do Jurors Understand Criminal Jury Instructions? U. MICH. J. L. REF. 401, 414 (1990).
43. David Strawn&Raymond Buchanan, Jury Confusion:AThreat to Justice, 59 JUDICATURE 478, 480-481 (1976).
44. People v. Feldman, 71 N.E. 2d 433, 439 (1947). (This was drawn to my attention by L. Solan in his Refocusing the Burden of Proof, TEX. L. REV. 105, 113 (1999).
45. U. S. v. Witt, 648 F.2d 608, 612 (9th Cir. 1981) (Anderson, J., concurring).
46. See especially Jackson v. Virginia, 443 U.S. 307, 315 (1979); and In re Winship, 397 U.S. 358, 364 (1970), which both speak of BARD as denoting a “subjective state.”
47. Guiteau's Case, 10 F. 161, 163-64 (1882).
48. Holland, 348 U.S. 121 at 139-40 (1954). My italics.
49. The Supreme Court opined: “If the jury is convinced beyond a reasonable doubt, we can require no more.” Holland, 348 U.S. 121 at 138 (1954).
50. Brief discussions of Boyle's and Whewell's views can be found in chaps. 4 and 10 of my SCIENCE AND HYPOTHESIS (1981).
51. These data come from James Liebman, The Overproduction of Death, 100 COLUM. L. REV., 2030 (2000).
52. Lillquist, These data come from James Liebman note 4, at 92.
53. Rita Simon & Linda Mahan, Quantifying Burdens of Proof: A View from the Bench, the Jury and the Classroom, 5 LAW & SOC'Y. REV. 319, 322 (1971).
54. Lillquist, Quantifying Burdens of Proof: A View from the Bench, the Jury and the Classroom note 4, at 144.
55. This standard was laid down in Victor, 114 S. Ct. at 1243 (1994) and in Boyde v. California, 494 U.S. 370, 380 (1990).