What is the nomination process for Supreme Court justices and federal judges? Find out in a multimedia package of educational resources geared to high school students, their teachers, and interested adults. What do judges promise in the judicial oath of office? What is the role of justices and judges? What kinds of information are nominees asked to share during the nomination process? What do judges, themselves, say about what it means to be impartial?
Court Shorts: An Impartial Federal Judiciary
This short video from the U.S. Courts focuses on the importance of a fair and impartial judiciary. What does this concept mean to you? In this video, students question federal judges on these principles.
Flowers v. Mississippi (2019)
Did the Mississippi Supreme Court err in how it applied Batson v. Kentucky in this case? This case summary shows how the Supreme Court answered this question in 2019.
Choosing an Impartial Jury
In this lesson, students are asked to select from a list of potential jurors those most likely to be fair and impartial in a trial of Goldilocks v. The Three Bears. Students are prompted to justify why each juror they chose would be impartial, and so gain an understanding of the challenges associated with selecting an impartial jury.
Sixth Amendment Activities
Apply landmark Supreme Court cases to contemporary scenarios related to your right to counsel and your right to a fair trial in the Sixth Amendment.
A Conversation on the Right to Trial by an Impartial Jury
Justices Sandra Day O’Connor, Stephen G. Breyer and Anthony M. Kennedy discuss with high school students the Edmonson v. Leesville Concrete Co. case and the Sixth Amendment right to trial by an impartial jury. The video complements the documentary Jury Selection: Edmonson v. Leesville Concrete Co.
Classifying Arguments Activity: Flowers v. Mississippi
Classifying Arguments is a SCOTUS case study strategy in which students are given arguments from each side of a case and tasked with identifying whether each argument supports the petitioner or the respondent. In this classroom-ready activity, students will examine arguments from Flowers v. Mississippi, which asks: Did the Mississippi Supreme Court err in how it applied Batson v. Kentucky in this case? An answer key is also available for download.
Jury Selection: Edmonson v. Leesville Concrete Co.
This documentary examines the landmark case in which the Supreme Court decided that the Fourteenth Amendment’s equal protection clause prevents the use of race-based peremptory challenges to reject potential jurors in civil cases. A PDF lesson plan accompanies this video.
To Kill A Mockingbird and the Scottsboro Boys Trial: Profiles in Courage
Students study select court transcripts and other primary source material from the second Scottsboro Boys Trial of 1933, a continuation of the first trial in which two young white women wrongfully accused nine African-American youths of rape.
FAQs: Juries
Eleven short videos feature constitutional experts, lawyers and judges who discuss juries and jury service, including the English and American histories of juries, what to expect as a juror, how a trial works, how grand juries work, and insights from judges, prosecutors and defense lawyers.