Cite as: 508 U. S. 275 (1993)
Opinion of the Court
find the existence of those facts beyond a reasonable doubt." Rose v. Clark, supra, at 580. And when the latter facts "are so closely related to the ultimate fact to be presumed that no rational jury could find those facts without also finding that ultimate fact, making those findings is functionally equivalent to finding the element required to be presumed." Carella v. California, 491 U. S. 263, 271 (1989) (Scalia, J., concurring in judgment). See also Pope, supra, at 504 (Scalia, J., concurring). A reviewing court may thus be able to conclude that the presumption played no significant role in the finding of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. Yates, supra, at 402-406. But the essential connection to a "beyond a reasonable doubt" factual finding cannot be made where the instructional error consists of a misdescription of the burden of proof, which vitiates all the jury's findings. A reviewing court can only engage in pure speculation—its view of what a reasonable jury would have done. And when it does that, "the wrong entity judge[s] the defendant guilty." Rose, supra, at 578.
Another mode of analysis leads to the same conclusion that harmless-error analysis does not apply: In Fulminante, we distinguished between, on the one hand, "structural defects in the constitution of the trial mechanism, which defy analysis by 'harmless-error' standards," 499 U. S., at 309, and, on the other hand, trial errors which occur "during the presentation of the case to the jury, and which may therefore be quantitatively assessed in the context of other evidence presented," id., at 307-308. Denial of the right to a jury verdict of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt is certainly an error of the former sort, the jury guarantee being a "basic protectio[n]" whose precise effects are unmeasurable, but without which a criminal trial cannot reliably serve its function, Rose, supra, at 577. The right to trial by jury reflects, we have said, "a profound judgment about the way in which law should be enforced and justice administered." Duncan v. Louisiana, 391 U. S., at 155. The deprivation of that right,
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