J. E. B. v. Alabama ex rel. T. B., 511 U.S. 127, 32 (1994)

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158

J. E. B. v. ALABAMA ex rel. T. B.

Scalia, J., dissenting

and result"). But times and trends do change, and unisex is unquestionably in fashion. Personally, I am less inclined to demand statistics, and more inclined to credit the perceptions of experienced litigators who have had money on the line. But it does not matter. The Court's fervent defense of the proposition il n'y a pas de différence entre les hommes et les femmes (it stereotypes the opposite view as hateful "stereotyping") turns out to be, like its recounting of the history of sex discrimination against women, utterly irrelevant. Even if sex was a remarkably good predictor in certain cases, the Court would find its use in peremptories unconstitutional. See ante, at 139, n. 11; cf. ante, at 148-149 (O'Connor, J., concurring).

Of course the relationship of sex to partiality would have been relevant if the Court had demanded in this case what it ordinarily demands: that the complaining party have suffered some injury. Leaving aside for the moment the reality that the defendant himself had the opportunity to strike women from the jury, the defendant would have some cause to complain about the prosecutor's striking male jurors if male jurors tend to be more favorable toward defendants in paternity suits. But if men and women jurors are (as the Court thinks) fungible, then the only arguable injury from the prosecutor's "impermissible" use of male sex as the basis for his peremptories is injury to the stricken juror, not to the defendant. Indeed, far from having suffered harm, petitioner, a state actor under our precedents, see Georgia v. McCollum, 505 U. S. 42, 50-51 (1992); cf. Edmonson v. Lees-ville Concrete Co., 500 U. S. 614, 626-627 (1991), has himself actually inflicted harm on female jurors.2 The Court today

2 I continue to agree with Justice O'Connor that McCollum and Edmondson erred in making civil litigants and criminal defendants state actors for purposes of the Equal Protection Clause. I do not, however, share her belief that correcting that error while continuing to consider the exercise of peremptories by prosecutors a denial of equal protection will make things right. If, in accordance with common perception but con-

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