Juries play an essential role in Anglo-American legal systems, and now that many countries like the U.S. have abolished compulsory military service, jury duty provides a rare civic opportunity to work with your fellow citizens for the greater good. For our part, we were called for jury duty in Orange County, Florida yesterday (25 March), but most of my fellow citizens and I were discharged from the jury pool by the end of the day. (A new batch of prospective jurors will show up tomorrow to replace us and replenish the jury pool.) In many ways, however, being called from the jury pool to serve on an actual jury is a lot like a negative lottery: if you are busy and can’t afford to miss work, you feel a great sense of guilty relief if you are not called to serve on a jury …

Image above courtesy of Lisabeth Posthuma.