408
Opinion of Thomas, J.
such a showing is the foremost requirement of third-party standing, as evidenced by the lengths to which it went in an attempt to justify its finding of injury in fact.
The Court's finding of a close relationship (an ambient fraternity of sorts) between petitioner and the black veniremen whose rights he seeks to vindicate is likewise unsupported. The Court, of course, never identifies precisely whose rights petitioner seeks to vindicate. Is it all veniremen who were not chosen as foreman? Is it all nonwhite veniremen? All black veniremen? Or just the black veniremen who were not ultimately chosen for the grand jury? Leaving aside the fact that the Court fails to identify the rights-holders, I fail to see how a "close relationship" could have developed between petitioner and the veniremen. Even if a "bond," Powers v. Ohio, supra, at 413, could develop between veniremen and defendants during voir dire, such a bond could not develop in the context of a judge's selection of a grand jury foreman—a context in which the defendant plays no role. Nor can any "common interest" between a defendant and excluded veniremen arise based upon a public humiliation suffered by the latter, because unlike the exercise of peremptory strikes, Evangeline Parish's process of selecting fore-men does not constitute "overt" action against particular veniremen. Rather, those veniremen not chosen (all but one) are simply left to take their chances at being randomly selected for the remaining seats on the grand jury.
Finally, there are ample opportunities for prospective jurors whose equal protection rights have been violated to vindicate those rights, rather than relying upon a defendant of another race to do so for them. In contrast to the Batson line of cases, where an allegation may concern discrimination in the defendant's case alone, in this case petitioner alleges systematic discrimination in the selection of grand jury fore-men in Evangeline Parish. Such systematic discrimination provides a large class of potential plaintiffs and the opportu-
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