Inaccurate View of the Legal System Essay -- Law Jury System

Although often interpreted differently by soulfulnesss, legal rights, human rights and thejury formation ar essential features of the legal system. Nielsen believes that the main purpose ofrights is to protect individuals, while Hajjar portrays the objective of the legal system asrecognizing and respecting certain inherent human rights. Further, Dooley understands the jurysystem as essential for ensuring a democratic and fair trial procedure. As rights and the jurysystem are viewed according to these varying objectives, it bets there is a customary assumptionthat the legal system is intended to protect individuals from the forcefulness of the government.However, individuals abstract idea of how the fairness works can be contrary to the actual workingsof the legal system. Rights and the jury system create the expectation in people that they will beprotected from the power of the government, and yet these expectations often remain unfulfilled,creating a disconnect between the i dea of protection and the reality of the legal system.In her article The Work of Rights and the Work Rights Do, Laura Beth Nielsen assertsthat legal rights are important for protecting individual autonomy and resisting the arbitrary ortyrannical imposition of state power (Nielsen 63). In the case of traditionally disadvantagedgroups, rights have provided a sense of power as a direct result of their nature. Nielsen explains,Rights are said to apply equally to everyone, they are neutral, and are backed by thelegitimate authority of law and the state, and that Rights are often thought of as naturallyinhering in persons (66, 68). Because many minority groups view rights as inalienable,absolute, and supported by the government, they... ...ermining the very ideal that rights seem to stand for. The inconsistency between expectationsand individuals lived experiences seems to show that rights and the jury system are fundamentalto our democratic society, but only when the government feels th ey should be so.Works CitedMLA quotation markDooley, Laura Gaston. Our Juries, Our Selves The Power, Perception and Politics of the CivilJury. Before the Law An Introduction to the Legal Process. Ed. John J. Bonsignore., et.al. Boston Houghton Mifflin Company, 2006. pp. 450-453.Hajjar, Lisa. Human Rights. Reader 55-62.Margulies, Joseph. A Prison Beyond the Law. The Virginia every quarter Review. Reader119-128.Nielsen, Laura Beth. The Work of Rights and the Work Rights Do A Critical Approach.Reader 45-79.Toyosaburo Korematsu v. United States, 323 U.S, 214 (1944). Reader 91-102.