Opinion ID: 2832718
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Right to Serve on Federal Juries

Text: The majority announces that it will “assume” for purposes of this case that Walker’s federal right to serve on a jury has been restored pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1865(b)(5). Maj. Op. at 1 The Supreme Court has implicitly approved relying on this triad of rights to test whether a felon’s civil rights have been restored. See Logan, 552 U.S. at 28 (“While § 921(a)(20) does not define the term ‘civil rights,’ courts have held, and petitioner agrees, that the civil rights relevant under the above-quoted provision are the rights to vote, hold office, and serve on a jury.”); Caron, 524 U.S. at 316 (1998) (“Restoration of the right to vote, the right to hold office, and the right to sit on a jury turns on so many complexities and nuances that state law is the most convenient source for definition.”). No. 14-5703 Walker v. United States Page 19 5. The majority’s squeamishness on this issue is difficult to understand—the majority identifies no reasonable alternative interpretation of § 1865 which would support any other conclusion, and it is impossible to identify what more could be required for Walker to meet that standard. The federal statute provides that a person shall be deemed “qualified to serve on grand and petit juries in the district court unless he . . . has been convicted in a State or Federal court of record of, a crime punishable by imprisonment for more than one year and his civil rights have not been restored.” § 1865(b)(5) (emphasis added). Because this language is nearly identical to the language in § 921(a)(20), the three civil rights identified in Cassidy—the right to vote, to hold office, and to serve on a jury—may properly be considered here as well. See Cassidy, 899 F.2d at 549; see also United States v. Green, 532 F. Supp. 2d 211, 212 (D. Mass. 2005) (holding that the term “civil rights” in § 1865 “plainly involves the right to vote, to serve on juries, to run for office”) (citing Cassidy, 899 F.2d at 549). If the measuring stick is state law—after all, 28 U.S.C. § 1865(b)(5) does not contain a choice of law clause like the one in 18 U.S.C. § 921(a)(20)—then it is plain that Walker’s civil rights have been restored and he may again serve on a federal jury. The Tennessee state court order obtained by Walker restored to him all “civil and citizenship rights,” specifically including “the right to vote, the right to serve on a jury, and the right to hold an office of public trust.” (R. 1-1 at PageID 9-10.) Tennessee courts are authorized to restore “full rights of citizenship” under the procedure outlined in Tenn. Code Ann. §§ 40-29-101 to 40-29-105, and there is no dispute that the court-ordered restoration of Walker’s state civil rights was valid. See May v. Carlton, 245 S.W.3d 340, 344 (Tenn. 2008) (classing “serving as a juror” among the “rights of citizenship” affected by a conviction); Tenn. Code Ann. § 22-1-102 (providing that convicted felons lose their right to serve on a jury); State v. Black, 2002 WL 1364043, -12 (Tenn. Ct. App. 2002) (affirming the restoration under § 40-29-105 of the petitioner’s right to vote); Bryant v. Moore, 279 S.W.2d 517 (Tenn. 1955) (holding that the right to seek and hold public office was encompassed in the restoration of rights under substantially similar prior statutory language). To the extent Walker’s federal civil rights are relevant to § 1865(b)(5), his federal right to vote has been restored by operation of law as a result of the reinstatement of his voting rights under state law, U.S. Const. art. I, § 2, cl. 1; id. amend. XVII, and his right to seek and hold federal office is, as discussed above, unaffected by his felony conviction. Walker has thus met No. 14-5703 Walker v. United States Page 20 any conceivable requirement for the restoration of his right to serve on a federal jury. Applying the same plain-meaning interpretation that the Supreme Court gave the parallel provision in §921(a)(20), the right “had been taken away” from him as a consequence of his felony conviction under § 1865(b)(5), and it has been “give[n] back” under the terms of the same provision as a consequence of the restoration of his civil rights under state law. See Logan, 552 U.S. at 31 & n. 3.