Cite as: 523 U. S. 392 (1998)
Opinion of the Court
ernment to use a grand jury to initiate a prosecution, and 22 States adopt a similar rule as a matter of state law. See 1 Beale, supra, § 1:2, at 1-3; see also Hurtado v. California, 110 U. S. 516 (1884) (Fifth Amendment's grand jury requirement is not binding on the States). The grand jury, like the petit jury, "acts as a vital check against the wrongful exercise of power by the State and its prosecutors." Powers, supra, at 411. It controls not only the initial decision to indict, but also significant decisions such as how many counts to charge and whether to charge a greater or lesser offense, including the important decision to charge a capital crime. See Vasquez v. Hillery, 474 U. S. 254, 263 (1986). The integrity of these decisions depends on the integrity of the process used to select the grand jurors. If that process is infected with racial discrimination, doubt is cast over the fairness of all subsequent decisions. See Rose, supra, at 555-556 ("Selection of members of a grand jury because they are of one race and not another destroys the appearance of justice and thereby casts doubt on the integrity of the judicial process").
Powers emphasized the harm inflicted when a prosecutor discriminates by striking racial minorities in open court and in front of the entire jury pool. The Court expressed concern that this tactic might encourage the jury to be lawless in its own actions. See 499 U. S., at 412-413. The State suggests this sort of harm is not inflicted when a single grand juror is selected based on racial prejudice because the discrimination is invisible to the grand jurors on that panel; it only becomes apparent when a pattern emerges over the course of years. See Brief for Respondent 16. This argument, however, underestimates the seriousness of the allegations. In Powers, even if the prosecutor had been motivated by racial prejudice, those responsible for the defendant's fate, the judge and the jury, had shown no actual bias. If, by contrast, the allegations here are true, the impartiality and discretion of the judge himself would be called into question.
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