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Page Number: 11.0

8 

RAMOS v. LOUISIANA 

Opinion of the Court 

the  first  time—in  Apodaca  v.  Oregon25  and  a  companion 
case, Johnson v. Louisiana.26  Ultimately, the Court could
do  no  more  than  issue  a  badly  fractured  set  of  opinions.
Four dissenting Justices would not have hesitated to strike
down the States’ laws, recognizing that the Sixth Amend-
ment  requires  unanimity  and  that  this  guarantee  is  fully 
applicable against the States under the Fourteenth Amend-
ment.27    But  a  four-Justice  plurality  took  a  very  different
view of the Sixth Amendment.  These Justices declared that 
the  real  question  before  them  was  whether  unanimity 
serves an important “function” in “contemporary society.”28 
Then, having reframed the question, the plurality wasted 
few  words  before  concluding  that  unanimity’s  costs  out-
weigh its benefits in the modern era, so the Sixth Amend-
ment should not stand in the way of Louisiana or Oregon.

The ninth Member of the Court adopted a position that 
was neither here nor there.  On the one hand, Justice Pow-
ell agreed that, as a matter of “history and precedent, . . . 
the Sixth Amendment requires a unanimous jury verdict to
convict.”29  But, on the other hand, he argued that the Four-
teenth Amendment does not render this guarantee against
the federal government fully applicable against the States. 
In  this  way,  Justice  Powell  doubled  down  on  his  belief  in
“dual-track” incorporation—the idea that a single right can
mean two different things depending on whether it is being 
invoked against the federal or a state government. 

Justice Powell acknowledged that his argument for dual-

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25 406 U. S. 404 (plurality opinion). 
26 406 U. S. 356. 
27 See Apodaca, 406 U. S., at 414–415 (Stewart, J., joined by Marshall
and Brennan, JJ., dissenting) (“Until today, it has been universally un-
derstood  that  a  unanimous  verdict  is  an  essential  element  of  a  Sixth 
Amendment jury trial. . . . I would follow these settled Sixth Amendment 
precedents”);  Johnson,  406  U. S.,  at  382–383,  391–393  (Douglas,  J.,
joined by Marshall and Brennan, JJ., dissenting).

28 Apodaca, 406 U. S., at 410. 
29 Johnson, 406 U. S., at 371 (concurring opinion).