Batson v. Kentucky 1986

• Author: Daniel Brannen, Richard Hanes, Elizabeth Shaw
• Pages: 388-392

Contenidos

• Jury of His White Peers.
• Discrimination Disallowed.
• Leaving Long Traditions Behind.
• Impact.
• Suggestions for further reading.

Page 388

Petitioner: James Kirkland Batson

Respondent: State of Kentucky

Petitioner's Claim: That by striking African Americans from his jury, the prosecutor violated his constitutional rights.

Chief Lawyer for Petitioner: J. David Niehaus

Chief Lawyer for Respondent: Rickie L. Pearson, Assistant Attorney General of Kentucky

Justices for the Court: Harry A. Blackmun, William J. Brennan, Jr., Thurgood Marshall, Sandra Day O'Connor, Lewis F. Powell, Jr., John Paul Stevens, Byron R. White

Justices Dissenting: Warren E. Burger, William H. Rehnquist

Date of Decision: April 30, 1986

Decision: The Supreme Court sent Batson's case back to the trial court to determine whether the prosecutor had race-neutral reasons for striking African Americans from the jury.

Significance: With Batson, the Supreme Court said striking jurors because of their race violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.

The Sixth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution gives every American the right to be tried by an impartial jury when accused of a crime. An impartial jury is one that is fair, neutral, and open-minded. The use of impartial juries allow defendants to be judged fairly by their peers from the community.

Page 389

Associate Justice Lewis F. Powell. Courtesy of the Supreme Court of the United States.

Selecting a jury for a case is a two-stage process. In the first stage, the court creates a large pool of people from the community to serve as jurors. This pool is called a venire. In the second stage, the court and lawyers select twelve people from the venire to be the jury for a specific case. During this stage the lawyers for both parties get to make jury challenges. A jury challenge allows the parties to exclude specific people from the jury.

There are two kinds of jury challenges. A challenge "for cause" happens when a party has a good reason to believe a potential juror might not be able to decide a case fairly. For example, if a potential juror is the defendant's brother, the prosecutor can use a for cause challenge to prevent the brother from serving on the jury. There is no limit to the number of for cause challenges a party can make during jury selection.

The second kind of challenge is called a peremptory challenge. Each party gets a limited number of peremptory challenges. They allow the...