Batson v. Kentucky addresses discrimination in jury selection based on race under which constitutional principle?

• A. Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment
• B. First Amendment
• C. Fifth Amendment
• D. Eighth Amendment

Answer: (A)

The key idea is that racial bias in who sits on a jury violates equal protection. Batson v. Kentucky held that excluding potential jurors solely because of their race breaches the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. This case established that peremptory challenges used to strike jurors cannot be based on race, and it set up a practical framework to test claims of such discrimination: the challenger must show a prima facie case of racial motivation, the proponent must provide a race-neutral reason for the strike, and the court then decides whether that reason is a pretext for racial exclusion. The other amendments protect different rights (speech, due process in other contexts, or cruel and unusual punishment) and do not address race-based exclusion in jury selection, making equal protection the correct principle here.