Historical Research On The Right To Silence Of America

The right to silence is a fundamental right of the defendants and suspects in moderncriminal proceedings. Criminal suspects or defendants facing official inquiry can advocateSilence Right to remain silent or refuse to answer relevant questions. Many countries havemade the provisions of the right to silence in the domestic law since established as animportant judicial way of safeguarding individual rights. The right to silence is a reflection ofthe strong desire of citizens in a society governed by the rule of law to protect its interestsagainst might persecution from the nation, and the reflection of the relationship betweengovernment and individuals. A American judge once said: the penalty execution method canreflect the quality of a nation’s Civilization in a way. With the progress of democracy and therule of law, the right to silence has been widely recognized and included in a series ofdocuments of international law as a fundamental right in international human rights law. Thetrend of the development of the Right to Silence system is constantly enrich and strengthen,Reviewing the development history of the right to Silence can understand the evolution of thissystem and its connotations better.This article is divided into three partsIt’s a long history that the right to Silence as an important system is used to protect theright of criminal suspects and defendants in the Western world. The first part of this paperwants to define the concept of the right to silence and explore the origins of the right tosilence. Now, the academia still has dispute about the concept of right to silence, this paperjust focuses on criminal suspects and defendants’ right of silence in criminal proceedings. Theorigin of the right to silence is diverse, summed up as follows: the Christian doctrine, theEnglish common law tradition, Magna Carta, ius commune and Latin motto. through thepursuit the origin, we can learn more deeply about the right to silence.The second part is about the establishment of the right to silence. Right to silence wasfirst established in the United Kingdom, and its establishment should attribute to the longstruggle of the people. Initially, the right not to accuse oneself is used to oppose the “exofficio oaths” used by church courts, also a tactics used by the secular courts to attact thechurch courts. Later, as the procedures was adopted in secular courts and extensively used, theright to silence become a tool struggling for civilization adjudgement to safeguard their rightsand interests. After a series representative case, the right of against self-incrimination has finally been established on the legislation. However, due to the traditional litigation mode, thecriminal suspects or defendants can not actually enjoy the right of silence. In the late18thcentury, a large number of lawyers began to participate in the criminal proceedings, litigationmode changed, the establishment of doctrine of the presumption of innocence and changes inthe rules of evidence made the suspects and the accused may choose to remain silent, the rightto silence established in the British judicial practice finally.The third part is the history of the development of the right to silence in the United States,it is also the focus of this paper. The United States inherited the British law about the right tosilence system and in there the right is developed to the peak. British justice system hasfar-reaching impact on the system of the United States, the same applies to the right to silence.America in colonial period, the adjudgement mode also experienced a process of change justlike the British. Through the legislative practice of the constitution in many state like Virginiaand Pennsylvania, in1791, the Fifth Amendment of the Constitution establishes “No personshall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself”. After theestablishment of the Fifth Amendment of the United States Constitution, the legislationexpand the scope of application and give the right of testify to the accused, the right to silencehas been established in the United States eventually. The establishment of Miranda rulesmeans the right to silence has developed to the peak in the United States. However, due to thefatal defect, the Miranda rules has been criticized widely. The supreme court leaded by ChiefJustice Rehnquist adhere to the route that it should restrict the discretionary power of thepolice in investigation prudently as we assert the authority of the Miranda rule. Through aseries classical jurisprudence, The Supreme Court has established a set of application rules ofthe Miranda rules, prompting the Miranda rules to be more reasonable and the right to silencesystem to be more reasonable and perfect.This paper wants to have a more profound understanding about the right to silence byreviewing the development history of the right. I believe that the history can tell us what kindof right to silence system is really needed to establish and protect.