A Primer on Fair Cross Section Jurisprudence

The phrase “a jury of one’s peers” brings to mind an image of a jury that perfectly mirrors its community in terms of demographic and attitudinal characteristics. In an ideal world, a perfectly representative jury would be best able to fulfill its role as the conscience of the community in judicial decision-making. As a practical matter, however, the legal requirements governing the composition of the jury do not mandate perfect representation of the jury pool. Rather, they set the minimum standards that state and federal courts must achieve to guarantee the Sixth Amendment and Equal Protection rights of criminal defendants to a jury drawn from a fair cross section of the community.