Exercise Your Right to Vote on the Jury
I’m not exempt from jury duty, and, when I receive the summons, my first reaction isn’t one of excitement. Like you, I think “Are you kidding me? Not that week!” But, when I consider the significance of serving on a jury, I am pleased to have the honor and opportunity to serve.
I seriously doubt you would readily surrender your right to vote, but your right to serve on a jury is as important to our community as your right to vote in elections. In fact, it is a right to vote, a right to have direct vote in the outcome of a case. While the outcome is important to the parties, the process is of vital importance to the community. By serving on the jury, you are preserving the rule of law for everyone in our community. You are protecting every individual’s right to a fair trial, you are performing the community’s obligation to enforce the laws, and you are providing civil litigants with their right to have their dispute adjudicated peacefully by impartial citizens from their community.
Thomas Jefferson described the importance of the jury by saying, “I consider trial by jury as the only anchor ever yet imagined by man, by which a government can be held to the principles of its Constitution.” Abraham Lincoln said, “The greatest service of citizenship is jury duty.” Finally, Harold Melton , the former Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Georgia, stated “Justice Needs Jurors.”
We especially need jurors as we are resuming jury trials in this pandemic. Please explore this website to see the ways we are working to protect you in this unique time. If you have COVID concerns, call (478) 621-6544.
I hope and trust you will step forward in service to your community and exercise your important right as juror in the State Court of Bibb County. We are counting on you.
– Jeff Hanson, Chief Judge of the State Court of Bibb County
Please click here to complete a brief questionnaire.
If you have any questions regarding excusal from jury service, please contact the Superior Court Clerk’s Jury Department .