The Fully Informed Jury Association was founded in 1989 in Helmville, Montana by Larry Dodge and Don Doig. It is a 501(c)3 non-profit association dedicated to education of all Americans about their rights, powers and responsibilities as trial jurors. In particular, FIJA seeks to restore the traditional trial by jury, and protect it from further incursions. FIJA believes that the jury is not only a dispenser of justice for the accused, but also crucial check and balance in our system of government. The power of the jury to judge not only the evidence, but also the merits of the law itself is central to its proper functioning as a judicial and political institution