Calls for Jury Reform

In light of the hung jury in the Blagojevich trial, this article suggests that the federal courts would be well served to embrace the jury reform efforts undertaken in the state courts. 

Mistrials are already rare in federal court, but some say they would be rarer still if the federal courts were to adopt the string of reforms that have revamped the actions of state court juries in the past 20 years, upending centuries of tradition. By some counts, the measures have halved the hung-jury rates in state criminal trials. The aim, says one of the nation's leading reformers, is to prevent the kind of outcome that happened in Chicago: a mistrial that leaves no one happy.

Time: Judicial Reform: How to Cut Down on Hung Juries