Trials

This is an illustration of why juries are awesome. I served on a jury once for a basic, run-of-the-mill car accident in Brooklyn. It was inspiring (not a word I think I've ever used without qualification) and eye opening.

Inspiring: The premise behind the judicial system is sound. People grumble, but they take their civic responsibilities seriously and try to be fair. (I recognize, of course, that it's far from perfect. But it's also amazing--ordinary people sitting in judgment of others. It's accepted--our verdict stood like the word of god, but with less fear of those pesky preachers and reformations. It's awe-inspiring--amazing, accepted, civic.)

Eye opening: Brooklyn, like DC, is astoundingly diverse. In his Slate piece, Dickerson alludes to how he's caught in the Beltway mentality, unable even to imagine that there's anyone outside it, until he watches the jury selection process. He should try just sitting in the jurors' waiting room, listening to the names being called and watching the people sitting around him. Hell, if he was ambitious, which I wasn't, he might even try talking to some of them. A former colleague of mine did on her Brooklyn jury-duty and was shocked (vaguely horrified, even, for what it said about her life, if I recall correctly) to learn just how many people were homeowners. These are just regular people, lower-middle class to middle class, who live in places like Flatbush, Canarsie, Midwood, and sundry other parts of deep Brooklyn, who have regular working- or middle-class jobs (certainly not at a prestigious advocacy organization, maybe with the MTA), and who are building futures for themselves with their jobs and their homes, which they own. Oh, and they're immigrants--Caribbean, Chinese, Russian, etc. Sure, they're not living in Brooklyn Heights, Williamsburg, Cobble Hill, Park Slope, Prospect Heights, or any of the other places you or I might actually be familiar with, and, sure, they might have miserable commutes, but they've got roots now and are going to become the new, successful middle class. And their kids'll do quite, quite well.

Deliberating with them (and waiting, lots of waiting) worked pretty well for me.

I realize that it's difficult for me not to come off as patronizing--"you immigrants, lifting yourselves up, aw, that's super"--but I like to think, Before you can patronize, you have at least to be aware. Plus, it's nice to know that New York still can do it.