Swain v. Alabama

Status

3,157 later cases cite Swain v. Alabama; 360 of those citations sat close to treatment language and were flagged for reading, and all of them have been read. Citations that did not sit near treatment language were not flagged and were not read one by one, so a court that weakened this case without using any of that language would not appear here.

Treatments

Overruled in part

• A defendant may establish purposeful racial discrimination in peremptory strikes from evidence at his own trial; the contrary Swain evidentiary requirement is overruled.

  Batson v. Kentucky · Supreme Court of the United States · filed April 30, 1986

  To the extent that anything in Swain v. Alabama, 380 U. S. 202 (1965), is contrary to the principles we articulate today, that decision is overruled.

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Declined to follow

• California rejected Swain’s burden of proving discriminatory strikes across multiple trials and adopted a state constitutional procedure for showing group bias in an individual trial.

  People v. Wheeler · Supreme Court of California · filed September 25, 1978

  For the reasons stated, the rule of Swain v. Alabama is not to be followed in our courts and the cases applying it are disapproved to that extent. (See fn. 35, ante.)36 Rather, all claims in California courts that peremptory challenges are being used to strike jurors solely on the ground of group bias are to be governed by article I, section 16, of the California Constitution and the procedure outlined above.

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• Massachusetts declined to follow Swain’s protection of unrestricted peremptory challenges and prohibited strikes based solely on group membership under article 12 of its Declaration of Rights.

  Commonwealth v. Soares · Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts · filed March 8, 1979

  A description of the latitude allowed in the use of peremptory challenges is set forth in Swain v. Alabama, supra.at 220: "The essential nature of the peremptory challenge is that it is one exercised without a reason stated, without inquiry and without being subject to the court’s control.” This court often has used similar language. See, e.g., Commonwealth v. Mitchell, 367 Mass. 419, 420 (1975); Commonwealth v. Stone, supra. The quoted passage goes too far, however.26 If the constitutional mandate of a jury which fairly reflects a cross section of the community is to signify more than hollow words in this Commonwealth, we cannot permit the peremptory challenge to be exercised with absolute and unbridled discretion.

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• Florida replaced Swain’s test with a state constitutional procedure allowing inquiry into racially discriminatory strikes in an individual trial.

  State v. Neil · Supreme Court of Florida · filed September 27, 1984

  As did the New York, California, and Massachusetts courts, we find that adhering to the Swain test of evaluating peremptory challenges impedes, rather than furthers, article I, section 16's guarantee. We therefore hold that the test set out in Swain is no longer to be used by this state's courts when confronted with the allegedly discriminatory use of peremptory challenges. Instead of Swain, trial courts should apply the following test.

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• The Alabama Supreme Court chose harmless-error review under the Alabama right to an impartial jury instead of the automatic-reversal reasoning adopted from Swain for denial of a cause challenge cured by a peremptory strike.

  Bethea v. Springhill Memorial Hosp. · Supreme Court of Alabama · filed April 19, 2002

  However, in Swain v. Alabama, 380 U.S. 202, 219, 85 S.Ct. 824, 13 L.Ed.2d 759 (1965), overruled on other grounds, Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79, 106 S.Ct. 1712, 90 L.Ed.2d 69 (1986), the United States Supreme Court stated, in dicta, that "[t]he denial or impairment of the right is reversible error without a showing of prejudice. " [6] (Emphasis added.) Some decisions of this Court as well as of the Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals reflect an adoption of this reasoning. See Dixon v. Hardey, 591 So.2d 3 (Ala. 1991); Knop v. McCain, 561 So.2d 229 (Ala.1989); Ex parte Rutledge, 523 So.2d 1118 (Ala.1988); Ex parte Beam, 512 So.2d 723 (Ala.1987); Uptain v. State, 534 So.2d 686, 688 (Ala.Crim.App.1988) (quoting Swain and citing Beam and Rutledge ); Mason v. State, 536 So.2d 127, 129 (Ala. Crim.App.1988) (quoting Uptain. ) As noted in the language quoted above from Dailey, this Court has returned to the "harmless-error" analysis articulated in the Ross v. Oklahoma, 487 U.S. 81, 108 S.Ct. 2273, 101 L.Ed.2d 80 (1988), and Martinez-Salazar, 528 U.S. 304, 120 S.Ct. 774, 145 L.Ed.2d 792 (2000), decisions. Because a defendant has no right to a perfect jury or a jury of his or her choice, but rather only to an "impartial" jury, see Ala. Const. 1901 § 6, we find the harmless-error analysis to be the proper method of assuring the recognition of that right.

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Limited

• Swain’s rule dispensing with proof of prejudice on direct appeal did not excuse a habeas petitioner from showing prejudice to overcome procedural default of a peremptory-challenge claim.

  James Earl Hines v. J. J. Enomoto, Director, California Department of Corrections, Respondent · Ninth Circuit · filed October 5, 1981

  Previous decisions indicate that on direct appeal we overturn a conviction where the defendant’s right to peremptory challenge has been abridged without requiring that the defendant demonstrate prejudice. See Swain v. Alabama, supra; United States v. Allsup, supra; United States v. Turner, supra. Because the right to peremptory challenge may be exercised by the defendant for whatever reason may seem fit at the time with no need for justification, see Swain v. Alabama, 380 U.S. at 219, 220, 221, 85 S.Ct. at 835, 836, a requirement on a direct appeal that the defendant show prejudice would render enforcement of the right practically impossible. Under Sykes, however, we are not at liberty to dispense with the “prejudice” prong of the contemporaneous objection rule. Hines accordingly must demonstrate that his state trial counsel would have challenged another juror or jurors had he been aware of the remaining challenges.

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• Swain’s automatic-reversal language does not require reversal for a state court’s good-faith denial of a peremptory challenge when the seated jury is qualified and unbiased; the remedy is a matter of state law.

  Rivera v. Illinois · Supreme Court of the United States · filed March 31, 2009

  Rivera relies in part on Swain, 380 U. S. 202, which suggested that “[t]he denial or impairment of the right [to exercise peremptory challenges] is reversible error without a showing of prejudice.” Id., at 219. We disavowed this statement in Martinez-Salazar, observing, albeit in dicta, “that the oft-quoted language in Swain was not only unnecessary to the decision in that case . . . but was founded on a series of our early cases decided long before the adoption of harmless-error review.” ... The mistaken denial of a state-provided peremptory challenge does not, at least in the circumstances we confront here, constitute an error of that character.

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Criticized

• The Court criticized Swain’s absolute-disparity test for failing to protect smaller population groups from possible jury underrepresentation.

  State v. Ramseur · Supreme Court of New Jersey · filed March 5, 1987

  Thus a 4% absolute disparity probably does not demonstrate impermissible underrepresentation where a group comprises 50% of the population (i.e., 50% of population, 46% of jury pool). However, where the cognizable group constitutes only 8% of the population, a 4% disparity may be significant (8% of population, 4% of jury pool). Under the Swain test, this second group would receive no protection against possible underrepresentation.

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Questioned

• The Supreme Court questioned Swain’s automatic-reversal statement as unnecessary to its decision and based on cases predating harmless-error review; it left the remedy for an actual impairment unresolved.

  United States v. Martinez-Salazar · Supreme Court of the United States · filed January 19, 2000

  Because we find no impairment, we do not decide in this case what the appropriate remedy for a substantial impairment would be. We note, however, that the oft-quoted language in Swain was not only unnecessary to the decision in that casé — because Swain did not address any claim that a defendant had been denied a peremptory challenge — but was founded on a series of our early eases decided long before the adoption of harmless-error review.

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