Chap. 35.—An ACT to amend and re-enact Section 5985 of the Code of Virginia,
as amended, relating to who are exempt from jury service. [H B 80|

Approved Ferbuary 21, 1946

Be it enacted by the General Assembly of Virginia:

1. That section fifty-nine hundred eighty-five of the Code of
Virginia, as amended, be amended and re-enacted, as follows:

Section 5985. Who are exempt from jury service—The Gov-
ernor and Lieutenant-Governor of the State, the members of the
General Assembly while actually in session, practicing attorneys,
licensed practicing physicians, duly licensed optometrists, dentists,
officers of any court, telephone and telegraph operators actually
employed as such, train dispatchers while in actual service as such, pilots
licensed under the laws of the United States or this state, the President
and Vice-President of the United States, the members of both Houses
of Congress and their respective officers, but only while such Houses of
Congress are actually in session, custom house officers, all postmasters,
post officers, post riders and stage drivers, all mariners actually employed
in the service of any citizen or merchant within the United States, the
Secretary of the Commonwealth, and Attorney General, the Treasurer,
Auditor of Public Accounts, Comptroller, members of the State Corpora-
tion Commission, the Commissioner of Agriculture, the Superintendent
of Public Instruction, the clerks of both houses of the General Assembly,
but only while such houses are actually in session, the judge of any court,
all professors, tutors and pupils of public seminaries, while such public
seminaries are actually in session, all ministers of the gospel licensed to
preach according to the rules of their sect, sheriffs, constables, all per-
sons while actually engaged in harvesting or securing grain, potatoes
or hay or in cutting or securing tobacco, keepers of the county and cor-
poration jails, superintendents and servants of public hospitals and luna-
tic asylums, the superintendent of the penitentiary and his assistants and
the persons composing the guard, the police in cities and towns, and all
ferrymen necessarily and personally employed in or at any ferry estab-
lished by law, undertakers who pay a license tax as such, and their regu-
larly employed assistants, and the active officers and members of the
Virginia National Guard, the Virginia State Guard and the Virginia
naval militia, and contributing members of the Virginia National Guard
and the Virginia State Guard who have contributed not less than twenty-
five dollars ($25.00) per annum, shall be exempt from serving on juries
in civil and criminal cases, but the active regularly employed and paid
nembers of the fire department of any city or town shall not be required
0 serve at any time, nor shall any registered pharmacist while engaged
n the practice of his profession be required to serve, nor any fruit grower
vhile actively engaged in harvesting his crops. The citizens of Tangier
sland in Accomack County and of Broad Water and Cobb Islands in
he County of Northampton shall be exempt from jury service, except
ervice on grand juries.