Jake Silverman, a Polish-Jewish immigrant charged with killing 2 white Protestants, smiles as he goes on trial for his life. After a lone juror refused to convict him of murder, enraged white supremacists amended the state constitution to allow non-unanimous jury verdicts (Oregon, 1934) [450 x 649].

[’12 Angry Men’ couldn’t have happened in Oregon](https://offbeatoregon.com/1809e.1812.silverman-verdict.html)

[Non-unanimous jury trials in Oregon](https://www.tullosbeckett.com/article-non-unanimous-jury-trials-in-oregon)

[Inside the gangland murder that gave Oregon its unusual jury system](https://www.oregonlive.com/pacific-northwest-news/2017/09/inside_the_1933_murder_trial_t.html)

Silverman was convicted of manslaughter and sentenced to three years in the Oregon State Penitentiary. The manslaughter conviction was an act of juror nullification. The holdout had lingering doubts about Silverman’s guilt, but was willing to support a compromise verdict on the grounds of probable guilt and Silverman being an extremely shady figure overall (he was a small-time gangster).

The amendment made Oregon one of only two states in the country to allow non-unanimous jury verdicts in non-capital felony cases. The other was Louisiana. Under its 1898 state constitution, a 9-3 vote was sufficient for a felony conviction. That was changed to 10-2 in 1973. In both states, the laws were explicitly motivated by racism.

>In an editorial, the Morning Oregonian newspaper, which covered Silverman’s trial, said the “vast immigration into America from southern and eastern Europe, of people untrained in the jury system, have combined to make the jury of twelve increasingly unwieldy and unsatisfactory.” The Legislature put the issue on the ballot, and voters passed it in 1934, allowing 10-2 verdicts.

Both states still required unanimous verdicts for capital felonies, but it should be pointed out that [non-capital felony convictions](https://www.propublica.org/article/louisiana-prison-split-jury-landry-law-lloyd-gray) ([he is still fighting](https://veritenews.org/2025/10/30/lloyd-gray-hearing-nonunanimous-jury-louisiana/)) can still effectively end your life. Also, death row inmates get far more appeals than other convicts.

In 2018, Louisiana voters approved a referendum to ban non-unanimous jury verdicts. The U.S. Supreme Court ordered Oregon to do the same in 2020. The law change in Oregon has been made retroactive, but the one in Louisiana does not apply to those who have already exhausted their appeals.

Most of the cases in Oregon have been resolved via plea agreements for reduced sentences.

My time as a juror left me very, very unimpressed by juries.