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The Need
The fundamental right to a trial by a jury of our peers is in jeopardy. Nationally, only 25% of citizens who are summoned for jury service in urban state and federal trial courts appear for service. Returns are higher in less urban areas, but are still well below desirable levels. Many citizens who do appear do so only after deferring their service one or more times. Once they appear for jury duty, angling to be dismissed from a jury panel is not uncommon. As a result, many urban courts are in increasing danger of being unable to form juries that are truly representative of their diverse communities.

Ironically, most of those who actually do serve as jurors emerge with positive views of the judicial system. In a 1999 public opinion survey done for the American Bar Association, 69 % of those polled said juries are the most important part of our justice system.

The Collaboration
In 1990, the then-chief judges of the DC Superior Court and the US District Court for DC wrote to the Council for Court Excellence, asking CCE to partner with them to develop and conduct a Jury Service Appreciation program with two purposes: to encourage District of Columbia citizens to respond to summons from the two trial courts and serve on juries, and to thank citizens for their past community service via jury service. This public/private collaboration produced annual Jury Service Appreciation Week or Jury Service Appreciation Month programs for ten years, from 1990 through 1999. The program began with a focus only on the District of Columbia, but it grew over the decade to involve participation by federal and state trial courts throughout the broad Washington region.

Each year’s program, focus, and activities were planned jointly by CCE and court administrators. CCE varied the media message each fall, when the campaign was traditionally undertaken. With the help of funding partners CCE was able to engage from the business and foundation communities, CCE Jury Service Appreciation activities included:

• executive and legislative proclamations of Jury Service Appreciation Month;
• business and civic organization resolutions supporting jury service;
• widespread public service advertising on buses, in public buildings, and on broadcast media;
• producing an interactive mock-trial video (Guilty or Not Guilty? You Decide) and bringing it to school audiences who participate in seeking a unanimous verdict;
• bringing judges, lawyers, and court administrators into school classrooms;
• judges, lawyers, and court administrators participating in radio interview programs on the jury subject;
• producing media kits with data on jury service requirements and procedures in all state and federal courts throughout the Washington region;
• publishing and distributing an informative brochure about jury service in the DC local and federal trial courts, Jury Duty: Tips for Citizens; and
• special court-run activities within each courthouse to show appreciation to jurors then serving.

The Challenges
Media indifference. Civic engagement and “good government” are not natural attractions for the print and broadcast media in the Washington area. They much prefer focusing on breaking news, especially about things gone wrong.

Identifying a fresh theme or activity each year. To attract both media attention and the necessary funding for the program, it was a challenge for the planning committee to come up with a fresh approach each year.

Matching judicial and teacher schedules. One of the most rewarding activities has always been bringing judges into school auditoriums and classrooms to convey the jury service appreciation message, especially through use of the CCE mock-trial video lesson. However, coordinating the busy schedules of both schools and judges to make such an event occur has always been a great challenge.

The Outcome
Thanks to strong publicity given since the mid-1990s by Tom Munsterman of the National Center for State Courts’ Center for Jury Studies to the jury appreciation efforts in the District of Columbia, CCE has responded over the years to inquiries and sent suggested materials to many other jurisdictions around the country. A good number of those jurisdictions have followed the Council for Court Excellence’s lead in promoting jury service. Courts in Arizona, California, Kentucky, Maryland, Minnesota, Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Washington, to name a few, have all adapted some or all of the public relations approaches first developed by the Council for Court Excellence and its DC court partners.
In 2005, the American Bar Association Commission on the American Jury published a very good Juror Appreciation Kit to guide court systems who wish to have a jury appreciation program.

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