A Playlist For Jury Duty

Graphic by Lily Hartenstein

By Harry Bates

The card arrived back in April. I thought it was a postcard from a beloved far-away friend, but it was something much more frightful. My eyes peered at the yellow 4x6 with its hideous sized-32 Times New Roman text spelling out the words “Jury Duty Notice.” The day had finally come when the Commonwealth was so desperate for judicial participation that they needed to reach out to a student residing here for less than a year.

Cut to October, and the date of my legally-obligated scheduled appearance had finally arrived. Here’s my playlist for the day, guiding me through a very flawed institution that makes me nauseous just to think about.

“Government Center” by the Modern Lovers

This is the perfect theme song for my morning commute on the Green Line from the sleepy outskirts of Boston to the bustling downtown district. The B-Line ride was just as usual; moving at a walking pace in Brighton then accelerating up to Lamborghini-like speed after entering the Kenmore tunnel. The Modern Lovers’ “Government Center” pairs well with the scene around city hall, with all walks of life jaunting the sidewalks of Tremont Street.

“Mama Tried - Live at Barton Hall, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY 5/8/77 ” by the Grateful Dead

I’ve been in a courthouse a few times, but the ones back home look like one-room schoolhouses compared to Boston’s skyscrapers of judicial supremacy. The first few, crisp notes of the Grateful Dead’s 1977 recording of “Mama Tried” in upstate New York rang through my head immediately as I checked in with dozens of other unlucky participants for a waiting room the size of my high-school cafeteria. Once seated, a propaganda presentation began to play on raised televisions, while a banner at the front of the room read “Massachusetts Superior Court – 150 Years of the Rule of Law.”

“Harper Valley P.T.A.” by Jeannie C. Riley

How can a human be apolitical? It just doesn’t make any sense to me that a person, as soon as they are politically appointed to a position, can just suddenly remove their bias and lifelong views with a snap of a finger. Jeannie C. Riley’s “Harper Valley P.T.A.'' explores the hypocrisy present within a group of powerful people telling others how they ought to act. This tune instantaneously bounced through my head as I looked around, feeling an eerie stare from a late, historical judicial figure in an oil painting above.

“With God On Our Side” by Odetta

As the day went on, I began to think more of this system that so many of us rely so much upon. An internal debate ensued: Why are we still depending on a system that dates back to colonial rule? Who is this working for? Who is this hurting? Who is benefiting from this? Odetta’s heartfelt cover of this poetic Bob Dylan song got to me, as its tone and content describes the ways in which our society and government shifts its morals to support whatever it wants to do. When looking at the integrity of the judicial system, it puts a lot into perspective – the largest crimes by the most powerful entities are rarely punished.

“Conversation With A Cop” by FANNY

I kept thinking about “Conversation With A Cop” by FANNY throughout the whole duration of my experience. The song details how people are treated much differently by authorities due to their natural appearances, sharing a story of police profiling a woman, presumably a woman of color, while she walks alone at night. FANNY, an all-female rock band dating back to the ‘70s which includes the awesome talents of June Millington, Jean Millington, Alice de Buhr, and Nickey Barclay, tells one perspective of this. Poor people, people of color, and people from other marginalized communities have been and continue to be profiled and targeted by a corrupt policing system in the United States. The impacts of this biased policing and a prison-focused court system can be seen throughout the criminal justice system, with, according to the ACLU, nearly one-in-three Black men sentenced to prison in contrast to one-in-seventeen White men.

“Cry Baby” by Janis Joplin

Joplin’s soul-capturing blues in “Cry Baby” reflected the somber vibes of the day. There’s something about the way she spaces lyrics and adds breath and strength to words; it’s just raw human emotion. Her ability to convey understandings from the human soul is something that feels very much missing from a place like this. From my experience, the Court feels more like an industrial factory than a venue that’s supposedly dealing with the complexities of human thought, emotion, and experiences.

“You Are Not Alone” by Mavis Staples

There’s an immense amount of pain in a courthouse, as it’s really the last place that anyone in the world wants to be. The common people that enter its doors – on both sides of a case – are most likely experiencing one of the worst days during one of the darkest periods of their entire lives. There’s a complex mixture of harm, anxiety, and grief mixed about those wood-paneled rooms under fluorescent lighting. A system that’s designed to judge and promote penalties of isolation fails to provide empathy, understanding, and paths to forgiveness to the people that need it most so such tragedies don’t repeat themselves again. Feeling is what makes us human, while empathy is what makes us smart and in-tune with our hearts. “You Are Not Alone” by Mavis Staples knocks at the soul of this idea; there are people out there no matter the circumstances that care and that want to see people find peace. Hopefully one day we can create a system that looks to solve the root of problems rather than further this idea of justice where we deprive broken people of the love they need most, put them behind bars, and celebrate the destruction of a person.