Object Anyway

More Perfect

WNYC Studios

Wnyc, Scotus, Perfect, History, Court, More, Documentary, Courses, Supreme, Education, Society & Culture

4.8 • 14.7K Ratings

🗓️ 16 July 2016

⏱️ 48 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

At the trial of James Batson in 1983, the prosecution eliminated all the black jurors from the jury pool. Batson objected, setting off a complicated discussion about jury selection that would make its way all the way up to the Supreme Court. On this episode of More Perfect, the Supreme Court ruling that was supposed to prevent race-based jury selection, but may have only made the problem worse.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	More perfect.
0:30.0	Alright let's do it. Yep. Hey I'm Chad Habum-Ram. This is more perfect. Many
0:50.8	series about the Supreme Court. And today's story from a reporter Sean always
0:55.6	F up your last name. Can you just say it?
0:57.3	Rommas firm. Rommas firm. I always put the accent in the wrong place. Anyhow, let me set the table for you.
1:02.7	We live in a representative democracy. And what does that actually mean practically speaking?
1:06.7	Like when do we come in contact with that democracy? Two places seems to me mainly. One, when we vote, right?
1:13.3	Yeah, you're asking me? Yeah. I was deep in thought. If you vote, if you vote, it's true. I know like college
1:19.9	educated super progressive human beings were like, why would I ever vote? It doesn't mean anything.
1:24.3	Exactly. Not to mention people who just don't even care about the world. Yeah, it sort of makes my point.
1:27.8	Like voting is the first way and for a lot of people it's entirely optional. The second way is not you
1:33.5	will be fined if you don't do it. And I mean serving on a jury. This is where like we the people decide
1:41.3	who goes to jail, who gets free, who lives, who dies. This is where we actually do democracy.
1:48.4	Today we start with the story of a guy who Supreme Court famous, would you say?
1:54.5	Yeah, he's in the books. He's like a chapter. Yeah, he's like one of the most important names
1:57.7	you've never heard of because he's at the center of this ongoing battle about who gets to serve on
2:02.5	juries. And his name, depending on who you are, either symbolizes the best parts of American
2:08.8	democracy or the most cynical. Should I say his name? Yeah, go for it. James Batzen. James Kirkland
2:16.4	Batzen.
2:22.2	James? Yeah. Sean. I went to his house in Louisville. Tell me your full name and tell me where you're from
2:27.8	and that bit. James Batzen, Louisville Kentucky. James Batzen, his name just kept coming up over and
2:32.9	over again when I was looking through the history of jury selection in America. So I called him up
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from WNYC Studios, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of WNYC Studios and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.