Taylor v. Louisiana 1975
| Author | Daniel Brannen, Richard Hanes, Elizabeth Shaw |
| Pages | 384-387 |
Page 384
Appellant: Billy Jean Taylor
Appellee: State of Louisiana
Appellant's Claim: That by excluding women, Louisiana's jury selection system violated his Sixth Amendment right to have an impartial jury.
Chief Lawyer for Appellant: William M. King
Chief Lawyer for Appellee: Kendall L. Vick
Justices for the Court: Harry A. Blackmun, William J. Brennan, Jr., Warren E. Burger, William O. Douglas, Thurgood Marshall, Lewis F. Powell, Jr., Potter Stewart, Byron R. White (writing for the Court)
Justices Dissenting: William H. Rehnquist
Date of Decision: January 21, 1975
Decision: The Supreme Court reversed Taylor's conviction.
Significance: With Taylor, the Supreme Court said juries must be selected from a fair cross section of the community, including both men and women.
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 juries in criminal trials allows defendants to be judged by their peers from the community.
Page 385
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 selects twelve people from the venire to be the jury for a specific case. In Taylor v. Louisiana, the U.S. Supreme Court had to decide whether Louisiana's jury selection system violated the Sixth Amendment.
On September 28, 1971, police arrested Billy Jean Taylor, a twenty-five year old convict in St. Tammany parish, Louisiana. (In Louisiana, a parish is a county.) The police charged Taylor with aggravated kidnapping, armed robbery, and rape. Taylor's trial was scheduled to begin on April 13, 1972.
Louisiana had a law that said women could not be selected for jury service unless they registered with the court. Men did not have to register to serve as jurors. The law had the effect of making women a rare sight on juries in St. Tammany parish. Only one out of every five women registered for jury service. Although women made up fifty-three percent of the people eligible for jury service in St. Tammany, the venire of one hundred seventy-five people selected before Taylor's trial contained no women.
The day before his trial, Taylor filed a motion to get rid of the venire. He...
To continue reading
Request your trial