Basil Baker

“ We have just called attention, however, to the fact that even a grand jury indictment must be held bad and must be quashed, although it furnish no evidence of guilt of the accused and that fact be judicially ascertained and determined by announcement of the highest court of the state, yet notwithstanding that fact a defendant may not be so indicted if there is the substantial form and semblance of discrimination by the systematic exclusion of members of the colored race and one of that race be indicted by grand juries so formed. ”

“ The removal of three from an improper venire upon which twenty-one improperly were left, certainly did not cure the error or meet the requirements of the substantive law of the land. The difference in this case and the Pierre Case is not the fact that an indictment was regularly found by the grand jury in the Louisiana case, while in the case at bar, under what we think is perhaps a more modern practice, defendants were charged and tried upon information filed by the prosecuting attorney, and, of course, in such instances grand jurors are not required and did not return any indictment. ”

“ The only difficulty or trouble arises in the practical application of these well-known, and we think universally recognized, propositions of law. The case at bar forms a somewhat startling example. The objection made and urged by the defendants and their counsel was not as to any individual member constituting the panels of the jury before which they were to be arrainged for trial. ”