Whether the Court should overrule Williams v. Florida, 399 U.S. 78 (1970)

In Ramos v. Louisiana , 590 U.S. 83 (2020), this Court overruled Apodaca v. Oregon , 406 U.S. 404 (1972)—a case that had previously endorsed nonunanimous juries as constitutionally permissible. In so doing, Ramos clarified that the scope of the Sixth Amendment jury trial right is defined by “historical meaning,” not by a “functionalist analysis.” 590 U.S. at 89–90, 106. Shortly before Apodaca , this Court had held in Williams v. Florida , 399 U.S. 78, 86, 98–99 (1970), that a 12-member panel “is not a necessary ingredient” of the Sixth Amendment jury trial right. The Court conceded that “the size of the jury at common law” was “fixed” at “12,” and “the Framers, the First Congress, [and] the States in 1789” “may well” have had “the usual expectation * * * that the jury would consist of 12.” Id. at 89–90, 98–99. The Court nevertheless concluded that 12-member panels were not required because the “function” of the jury does not depend on any “particular number” of jurors. Id. at 100–101. The Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure, as amended following Williams , “permit a jury of 11 persons to return a verdict,” even over a defendant’s objection, “if the court finds good cause to excuse a juror.” Fed. R. Crim. P. 23(b)(3). In this case, a federal district court applied that rule to accept a guilty verdict from 11 jurors after one of the originally empaneled jurors became ill during deliberations. The question presented is: Whether the Court should overrule Williams v. Florida, 399 U.S. 78 (1970).