“It is not only [the juror's] right, but his duty…to find the verdict according to his own best understanding, judgment, and conscience, though in direct opposition to the direction of the court.” (John Adams, America’s second President; 1771)
“It would be an absurdity for jurors to be required to accept the judge’s view of the law, against their own opinion, judgment, and conscience.” (John Adams)
“I consider trial by jury as the only anchor yet devised by man, by which a government can be held to the principles of its constitution.” (Thomas Jefferson, in a letter to Thomas Paine; 1789)
“The juries [are] our judges of all fact, and of law when they choose it.” (Thomas Jefferson to Samuel Kercheval; 1816. ME 15:35)
Even the First Chief Justice of the U.S. John Jay, in 1789, chimed in on this issue with, “The jury has the right to judge both the law as well as the fact in controversy.”
Lastly, and most succinctly, Alexander Hamilton, in 1804, said that, “Jurors should acquit, even against the judge’s instruction… if exercising their judgment with discretion and honesty, they have a clear conviction the charge of the court is wrong.”