CBA Record January-February 2025

FROM ATHENS to AMERICA Our Legal Roots By Justice Michael B. Hyman

T he law’s got plenty of Latin—those fancy maxims and phrases that make lawyers sound like they’re casting spells instead of arguing cases. Roman law seems baked into our legal system, too. But there’s a kicker: Ancient Greece deserves as much credit, maybe more. Its form of democracy set in motion Ancient Rome’s and our own. Political ideas, philosophical musings, and legal principles that form the backbone of Western jurisprudence all trace back to Ancient Greece. The only reason we don’t notice? Latin is more visible in English. So, let’s go back about 2,500 years to when Greeks were inventing things like democracy. It’s roughly 300 or 400 years before the Romans showed up with their togas. Picture a time when arguing was a national pastime and justice was a work in progress. Archons and Juries Archi means both beginning and rule , embodying the essence of leadership, authority, and respect—principles entrenched in the

Greek legal structure. The root arch appears in concepts like mon archy , anarchy , and golden arches . Another “arch” word, archon , a court magistrate, roughly cor responds to today’s judges. Initially chosen by family lineage, then land ownership, and, eventually, election, the role of Athens’s nine archons evolved with the city-state’s embrace of democracy. This shift curbed the archons’ power but kept them supervising jury selection. During their one-year term, archons used a technological wonder, the kleroterion, a marble contraption, to randomly select jury members for an assigned number of private and public cases. (If only our court clerks had kleroterions to assign judges to cases; the marbles would add a little excitement.) Archons also presided over cases of homicide. Juries were the decision makers. Every year, a pool of 6,000 citizens, chosen by lot, served as jurors. A hefty pool of 501 or more jurors would hear public cases because they involved broader societal harms and the poten tial for harsher penalties. (Think Socrates, who ended up with a koupa full of poison hemlock.) Between 201 and 400 jurors

24 January/February 2025

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