Source: https://m.openjurist.org/329/us/187
Timestamp: 2020-01-22 00:49:59
Document Index: 577001820

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 587', '§ 587', '§ 411', '§ 411', '§ 276', '§ 412', '§ 412', '§ 411', '§ 278', '§ 415', '§ 415', '§ 276', '§ 412', '§ 412', '§ 277', '§ 413', '§ 413', '§ 286', '§ 423', '§ 423', '§ 57', '§ 57', '§ 288', '§ 426', '§ 426']

329 U.S. 187 - Ballard v. United States
The point illustrates that the exclusion of women from jury panels may at times be highly prejudicial to the defendants. But reversible error does not depend on a showing of prejudice in an individual case.11 The evil lies in the admitted exclusion of an eligible class or group in the community in disregard of the prescribed standards of jury selection. The systematic and intentional exclusion of women, like the exclusion of a racial group, Smith v. Texas, 311 U.S. 128, 61 S.Ct. 164, 85 L.Ed. 84, or an economic or social class, Thiel v. Southern Pacific Co., supra, deprives the jury system of the broad base it was designed by Congress to have in our democratic society. It is a departure from the statutory scheme. As well stated in United States v. Roemig, D.C., 52 F.Supp. 857, 862, 'Such action is operative to destory the basic democracy and classlessness of jury personnel.' It 'does not accord to the defendant the type of jury to which the law entitles him. It is an administrative denial of a right which the lawmakers have not seen fit to withhold from, but have actually guaranteed to him.' Cf. Kotteakos v. United States, 328 U.S. 750, 66 S.Ct. 1239. The injury is not limited to the defendant—there is injury to the jury system, to the law as an institution, to the community at large, and to the democratic ideal reflected in the processes of our courts.
With the Glasser opinion before them and with the point properly preserved in their appeal papers, the abandonment of the issue by the petitioners, when the case came before the Circuit Court of Appeals and later before us, can mean only that they had no confidence in the claim, and that, in any event, they had not been hur by what is now deemed a fatal error. It hardly helps the proper administration of criminal justice to allow the defendants to resurrect a point which they had dropped four years earlier.*
Dismissal of this indictment will not put an end to prosecution for the offenses which it charges. And so it cannot in any event relieve the Court from the duty of deciding the central issue before us, namely, whether the mails may be used to obtain money by fraud when the final consists of a false claim of belief touching religion. Dismissal of this indictment does not terminate prosecution for these offenses because Congress by the Act of May 10, 1934, 48 Stat. 772, amended, July 10, 1940, 54 Stat. 747, 18 U.S.C. § 587, 18 U.S.C.A. § 587, has expressly saved this prosecution. By that Act, Congress allowed reindictment where an indictment was found defective but the basis of the prosecution is left untouched. As amended it provides that
Ever since its first Judicature Act Congress has subordinated federal practice to state law in determining the qualifications of federal jurors. In that Act it said: 'the jurors shall have the same qualifications as are requisite for jurors by the laws of the State of which they are citizens, to serve in the highest courts of law of such State, * * *.' Section 29, Act of September 24, 1789, 1 Stat. 73, 88. Similarly, the present law reads: 'Jurors to serve in the courts of the United States, in each State respectively, shall have the same qualifications, subject to the provisions hereinafter contained, and be entitled to the same exemptions, as jurors of the highest court of law in such State may have and be entitled to at the time when such jurors for service in the courts of the United States are summoned.' Section 275, Judicial Code, 36 Stat. 1087, 1164, 28 U.S.C. § 411, 28 U.S.C.A. § 411.1
There are ample grounds for distinguishing Thiel v. Southern Pacific Co., 328 U.S. 217, 66 S.Ct. 984, from this case. For example, in the Thiel case, the Court acted in the absence of actual notice that the objectionable practice had been discontinued,2 whereas, here, we have notice that the practice objected to was changed more than two years ago to conform, at least substantially, to the approved practice. Also, in the Thiel case, the procedure complained of consisted of the exclusion of an economic group, thereby detracting from the representative character of the jury list, in a manner contrary to the tradition and purpose of the jury system. Here the exclusion of women, as such, from jury service not only was in accordance with the traditional practice, but is in accordance with the congressionally approved future practice in the federal and state courts of about 40% of the states. This shows that the only objectionable practice here was that, after the State h d established a directory system of eligibility of women for state jury service, the federal court did not at once enlarge that policy into a mandatory requirement that all qualified women be placed upon all federal jury lists.
Thus Judicial Code § 276, 28 U.S.C. § 412, 28 U.S.C.A. § 412, provides for the drawing of 'All such jurors, grand and petit' from persons 'possessing the qualifications prescribed' in § 411.
Judicial Code § 278, 28 U.S.C. § 415, 28 U.S.C.A. § 415.
Judicial Code § 276, 28 U.S.C. § 412, 28 U.S.C.A. § 412.
Judicial Code § 277, 28 U.S.C. § 413, 28 U.S.C.A. § 413.
No person shall serve as a petit juror 'more than one term in a year'. Judicial Code § 286, 28 U.S.C. § 423, 28 U.S.C.A. § 423.
Artificers and workmen employed in armories and arsenals of the United States are exempted from service as jurors. 50 U.S.C. § 57, 50 U.S.C.A. § 57. Cf. Judicial Code § 288, 28 U.S.C. § 426, 28 U.S.C.A. § 426, dealing with disqualifications of jurors in prosecutions for bigamy, polygamy or unlawful cohabitation.
Cf. Wuichet v. United States, 6 Cir., 8 F.2d 561—563.