Evangelisto Ramos v. Louisiana

Summary

The Supreme Court overruled Apodaca v. Oregon and held that the Sixth Amendment right to a jury trial, applicable to the States through the Fourteenth Amendment, requires unanimity to convict a criminal defendant, reversing Evangelisto Ramos's Louisiana felony conviction by a 10-2 jury; the Court's opinion for the Court was authored by Justice Gorsuch. The supplied text consists of the separate writings: Justice Sotomayor concurred in all but Part IV-A, arguing that overruling was compelled and that the Jim Crow origins of the Louisiana and Oregon laws counted heavily in favor of it. Justice Kavanaugh concurred in part, offering a three-part stare decisis framework and opining that the new rule should not apply retroactively on federal habeas review, while Justice Thomas concurred only in the judgment and would have grounded the right in the Privileges or Immunities Clause rather than the Due Process Clause. Justice Alito, joined by the Chief Justice and by Justice Kagan as to all but Part III-D, dissented, contending that Apodaca was a binding precedent whose overruling disregards massive reliance interests and imposes a crushing burden on the two States.