Cite as: 537 U. S. 322 (2003)
Syllabus
which it interpreted as requiring petitioner to prove that the state-court decision was objectively unreasonable by clear and convincing evidence.
This was too demanding a standard because it incorrectly merged the clear and convincing evidence standard of § 2254(e)(1), which pertains only to state-court determinations of factual issues, rather than decisions, and the unreasonableness requirement of § 2254(d)(2), which relates to the state-court decision and applies to the granting of habeas relief. More fundamentally, the court was incorrect in not inquiring whether a "substantial showing of the denial of a constitutional right" had been proved, as § 2253(c)(2) requires. The question is the debatability of the underlying constitutional claim, not the resolution of that debate. In this case, debate as to whether the prosecution acted with a race-based reason when striking prospective jurors was raised by the statistical evidence demonstrating that 91% of the eligible African-Americans were excluded from petitioner's venire; by the fact that the state trial court had no occasion to judge the credibility of the prosecutors' contemporaneous race-neutral justifications at the time of the pre-trial hearing because the Court's equal protection jurisprudence then, dictated by Swain, did not require it; by the fact that three of the State's proffered race-neutral rationales for striking African-Americans—ambivalence about the death penalty, hesitancy to vote to execute defendants capable of being rehabilitated, and the jurors' own family history of criminality—pertained just as well to some white jurors who were not challenged and who did serve on the jury; by the evidence of the State's use of racially disparate questioning; and by the state courts' failure to consider the evidence as to the prosecution's use of the jury shuffle and the historical evidence of racial discrimination by the Dallas County District Attorney's Office. Pp. 341-348.
261 F. 3d 445, reversed and remanded.
Kennedy, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which Rehnquist, C. J., and Stevens, O'Connor, Scalia, Souter, Ginsburg, and Breyer, JJ., joined. Scalia, J., filed a concurring opinion, post, p. 348. Thomas, J., filed a dissenting opinion, post, p. 354.
Seth P. Waxman argued the cause for petitioner. With him on the briefs were David W. Ogden, Robin A. Lenhardt, Jim Marcus, and Andrew Hammel.
Gena Bunn, Assistant Attorney General of Texas, argued the cause for respondent. With her on the brief were John Cornyn, Attorney General, Howard G. Baldwin, Jr., First Assistant Attorney General, Michael T. McCaul, Deputy
325
Page: Index Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 NextLast modified: October 4, 2007