Timothy Noah: “The people have spoken; Donald Trump will be our next president. But the people also spoke last May when Trump was convicted on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records in connection with the 2016 election. That wasn’t quite so many people as last week—12 jurors, against roughly 76 million voters.
But no less than elections, juries are a vital part of American democracy.”Observed Alexis de Tocqueville in Democracy in America: “The jury is pre-eminently a political institution; it must be regarded as one form of the sovereignty of the people.”
“To honor that sovereignty, New York State Judge Juan Merchan—who’s delayed sentencing Trump three times, and on November 12 put off for one week deciding how to proceed—should sentence Trump to a week at Rikers Island, to be served before Trump is inaugurated president on January 20.”