Brown v. New Jersey, , is a United States Supreme Court case which held that the use of a struck jury

Struck jury

A struck jury is a multi-step process of selecting a jury from a pool. First potential jurors are eliminated for hardship. Second jurors are eliminated for cause by conducting voir dire until there is a pool available that is exactly the size of the final jury plus the number of peremptory...

 did not violate the Fourteenth Amendment

Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution

The Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution was adopted on July 9, 1868, as one of the Reconstruction Amendments.Its Citizenship Clause provides a broad definition of citizenship that overruled the Dred Scott v...

.

Background

On October 5, 1898, James Brown was found guilty of murder in the court of oyer and terminer

Oyer and terminer

In English law, Oyer and terminer was the Law French name, meaning "to hear and determine", for one of the commissions by which a judge of assize sat...

 in Hudson County, New Jersey

New Jersey

New Jersey is a state in the Northeastern and Middle Atlantic regions of the United States. , its population was 8,791,894. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York, on the southeast and south by the Atlantic Ocean, on the west by Pennsylvania and on the southwest by Delaware...

. He appealed to the New Jersey Court of Errors and Appeals, which affirmed the verdict. The case was remanded to the trial court, and Brown was sentenced to death by hanging

Hanging

Hanging is the lethal suspension of a person by a ligature. The Oxford English Dictionary states that hanging in this sense is "specifically to put to death by suspension by the neck", though it formerly also referred to crucifixion and death by impalement in which the body would remain...

. Brown was tried and sentenced under a state statute which provided for a struck jury and limited the defendant to five peremptory challenge

Peremptory challenge

Peremptory challenge usually refers to a right in jury selection for the defense and prosecution to reject a certain number of potential jurors who appear to have an unfavorable bias without having to give any reason...

s. If tried by an ordinary jury, the state allowed for twenty peremptory challenges. The decision to use a struck jury was under the discretion of the court. Brown petitioned the Supreme Court to strike down the law as violative of the due process and equal protection clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment.

The Supreme Court's decision

Justice David J. Brewer delivered the opinion of the Court. Brewer concluded that the state had wide latitude in prescribing the rules of court procedure:

The state has full control over the procedure in its courts, both in civil and criminal cases, subject only to the qualification that such procedure must not work a denial of fundamental rights, or conflict with specific and applicable provisions of the Federal Constitution.

Brewer held that the due process clause had not been violated since the use of struck juries could be traced to the common law

Common law

Common law is law developed by judges through decisions of courts and similar tribunals rather than through legislative statutes or executive branch action...

. Nor did the statute deny to the plaintiff equal protection of the law since it provided for an equal number of peremptory challenges in all cases tried by a struck jury.