Page:North Dakota Reports (vol. 1).pdf/59

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DAKOTA v. O'HARE.
35

dice the defendant. After the jury had been called and sworn individually as jurors, but before the oath had been administered to the panel as a body, objection was made by defendant's counsel "to the manner of selecting the jury." It appears that the trial court considered it very important that the specific ground of this objection should distinctly appear; and, accordingly, in settling the bill of exceptions, the trial court not only stated the ground of the objection, with the ruling thereon, and the exception allowed thereto, but superadded an explanation which serves the double purpose of showing affirmatively what the ground of the objection was, and also excluding negatively all other grounds. The following is the record: "When the jurors were called and sworn individually, there was no objection made or exception taken to the manner of impaneling them until after the jury was completed, and the jurors had been sworn, individually, to try the case, when the defendant excepted to the manner of selecting the jury. Afterwards the court ordered the jury to be sworn as a panel, in the same manner as though it was administered to them as individual jurors." To which record the court appended the following: "When the defendant excepted to the manner of selecting the jury, as stated and referred to in the foregoing remarks of the court, it was to the fact of the jurors being called and sworn singly by the court; and to this fact an exception was allowed, as indicated in the remarks of the court." Conceding, without deciding the point, that this objection had not been constructively waived by the fact that the defendant’s counsel had remained silent, and allowed the process of impaneling the jury, one at a time, to go forward to completion without objection, we will consider the objection upon its merits. The subject of challenging jurors is wholly a matter of statutory regulation. In criminal cases, it is provided that "before a juror is called the defendant must be informed by the court, or under its direction, that, if he intends to challenge an individual juror, he must do so when the juror appears, and before he is sworn." Also, that "a challenge to an individual juror is either (1) peremptory; or (2) for cause." "t must be taken when the juror appears and before he is sworn.” Code Crim. Proc. §§ 322-324 It is quite clear to us that these