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Reed v. Maryland9/6/1978
hen quote from McCormick, Evidence § 170 (1954), to the effect that general scientific acceptance "is a proper condition upon the court's taking judicial notice of scientific fact, but not a criterion for the admissibility of scientific evidence."
Professor Strong of the University of Oregon said in Questions Affecting the Admissibility of Scientific Evidence, 1970 U. Ill. L.F. 1 (1970):
"In addition to the requirement that the expert tendered be qualified to supply or apply the scientific principle or principles, there exists another requirement under which the testimony of persons professing acquaintance with principles unknown to the tribunal may be rejected. This requirement, which was first announced in Frye v. United States, is that the principle upon which the expert proposes to testify must have achieved general acceptance in the scientific community. However, unanimity of approval, manifestly impossible in a world still believed by some to be flat, is not required. The resulting standard, something greater than acceptance by the expert himself but less than acceptance by all experts in the field, is obviously somewhat lacking in definiteness. Some courts have seemingly rejected the Frye standard, and others have tailored it to fit unusual situations. Nevertheless, the rule continues to be widely accepted.
"In addition to the difficulties apparent in ascertaining whether a general proposition of science has or has not been generally accepted, the Frye standard has been criticized as overly rigorous and as introducing an element of inconsistency into the law of evidence." Id. at 10-11 (footnotes omitted).
Additional criticism of the Frye test is found in Decker & Handler, Voiceprint Identification Evidence -- Out of the Frye Pan and Into Admissibility, 26 AM. U. L. Rev. 314 (1977). Specifically, it is stated:
"The judicial trend denying admissibility of voiceprint identification evidence was based on a literal interpretation of the Frye standard of general scientific acceptance. Since the standard was drawn from dicta and formulated more than fifty years prior to advancements in science and technology such as spectrographic identification analysis, it is necessary that its validity be re-examined.
"The standard enunciated in Frye is one that is 'neither common to criminal litigation nor easily applied in the individual case.' Since its inception, the Frye standard has been the subject of criticism because of the limiting effect it has had on judicial acceptance of new methods of scientific investigation. In light of the rationale behind the Frye rule and its practical application to voiceprint identification evidence cases, it is apparent that the criticism is quite warranted.
"One of the reasons for the rule was to prevent the development of arbitrary decisions on issues of admissibility. Yet, enunciation of the Frye standard, without any definitive criteria as to who and how large the pertinent scientific community must be, has unnecessarily limited the discretion a trial court should have in utilizing relevant input. Indeed, while the Frye standard was utilized in State v. Cary and People v. King, it was not until United States v. Addison that one could find a comprehensive discussion of general scientific acceptance and how it ought to operate in the spectrographic analysis setting." Id. at 361-62 (footnotes omitted).
The authors further comment relative to Frye :
"Proponents of logical relevancy have criticized the Frye test, and suggested that there would be greater
unanimity in the treatment of all forms of scientific evidence if the Frye rule were modified in
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