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  3. Many Americans regard the jury system as a concrete expression of crucial democratic values, including the principles that all c

Many Americans regard the jury system as a concrete expression of crucial democratic values, including the principles that all c

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问题     Many Americans regard the jury system as a concrete expression of crucial democratic values, including the principles that all citizens who meet minimal qualifications of age and literacy are equally competent to serve on juries; that jurors should be selected randomly from a representative cross section of the community; that no citizen should be denied the right to serve on a jury on account of race, religion, sex, or national origin; that defendants are entitled to trial by their peers; and that verdicts should represent the conscience of the community and not just the letter of the law. The jury is also said to be the best surviving example of direct rather than representative democracy. In a direct democracy, citizens take turns governing themselves, rather than electing representatives to govern for them.
    But as recently as in 1968, jury selection procedures conflicted with these democratic ideals. In some states, for example, jury duty was limited to persons of supposedly superior intelligence, education, and moral character. Although the Supreme Court of the United States had prohibited intentional racial discrimination in jury selection as early as the 1880 case of Strauder v. West Virginia, the practice of selecting so-called elite or blue-ribbon juries provided a convenient way around this and other antidiscrimination laws。
    The system also failed to regularly include women on juries until the mid-20th century. Although women first served on state juries in Utah in 1898, it was not until the 1940s that a majority of states made women eligible for jury duty. Even then several states automatically exempted women from jury duty unless they personally asked to have their names included on the jury list. This practice was justified by the claim that women were needed at home, and it kept juries unrepresentative of women through the 1960s.
    In 1968, the Congress of the United States passed the Jury Selection and Service Act, ushering in a new era of democratic reforms for the jury. This law abolished special educational requirements for federal jurors and required them to be selected at random from a cross section of the entire community. In the landmark 1975 decision Taylor v. Louisiana, the Supreme Court extended the requirement that juries be representative of all parts of the community to the state level. The Taylor decision also declared sex discrimination in jury selection to be unconstitutional and ordered states to use the same procedures for selecting male and female jurors.
From the principles of the US jury system, we learn that_________.
选项 A、both literate and illiterate people can serve on juries
B、defendants are immune from trial by their peers
C、no age limit should be imposed for jury service
D、judgment should consider the opinion of the public
答案D
解析 本题考查考生对文中具体细节信息的理解和把握。本文第一段第一句直接点出了美国陪审机制遵循的主要原则，共有五个由that引导的同位语从句，意思分别为“所有符合年龄和文化程度最低要求的公民都可以从事陪审团的工作；陪审员应该从社会具有代表性的阶层随机选择；任何公民不应该因为种族、宗教、性别或者民族、籍贯原因而被剥夺参与陪审团工作的权利；被告可以被同辈人审判；裁决应该表达出社会的良知而不仅仅是法律条文的体现”。题干要求在四个选项中挑选符合这五个原则中的一个。选项[A]“有文化的人和文盲都可以从事陪审团工作”，显然与原则一相悖，因为对文化程度有minimal requirement。选项[B]“被告免于被同辈人审判”，这与原则四有出入。选项[C]“陪审团工作没有年龄限制”，与原则一相悖。因此只有选项[D]“判决应该考虑大众的意见”，这与原则五相符，故为正确答案。
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