HARMLESS ERROR
The legal doctrine of harmless error is found in the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, extensive case law, and state statutes. It comes into use when a litigant appeals the decision of a judge or jury, arguing that an error of law was made at trial that resulted in an incorrect decision or verdict. The appellate court then must decide whether the error was serious enough to strike down the decision made at trial. Review for harmless error involves a complicated test that
applies to state and federal laws as well as rules
of procedure. If an error is held to be serious, the
appellate court is likely to set aside the decision
of the trial court and may order a new trial. If it
deems the error harmless, the appellate court
affirms the lower court’s decision. The doctrine
of harmless error thus prevents an unnecessary
new trial when the error alleged would not have
affected the outcome at trial.
Harmless error JURISPRUDENCE grew out of
a late-nineteenth-century development in ENG-
LISH LAW. Before 1873, English courts automat-
ically reversed decisions in cases where an error
was committed at trial. In 1873, Parliament put
an end to this practice in civil cases by permit-
ting reversals only in cases of substantial error.
As the author Raymond A. Kimble has noted,
U.S. law slowly adopted the idea in order to limit
the number of retrials in U.S. courts.
In 1919, Congress first applied the harmless
