Page:Smith v. United States (2023).pdf/11

Rh 634; see, e.g., Palliser, 136 U. S., at 265. But the Vicinage Clause differs from the Venue Clause in two ways: it concerns jury composition, not the place where a trial may be held, and it narrows the place where trial is permissible by specifying that a jury must be drawn from “the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed.” Amdt. 6 (emphasis added).

Nothing about these differences dictates a remedy that is broader than the one awarded when the Venue Clause is violated. The vicinage right is only one aspect of the jury-trial rights protected by the Sixth Amendment, and we have repeatedly acknowledged that retrials are the appropriate remedy for violations of other jury-trial rights. See, e.g., Ramos v. Louisiana, 590 U. S. ___, ___–___ (2020) (slip op., at 22–23) (non-unanimous jury); Pena-Rodriguez v. Colorado, 580 U. S. 206, 228 (2017) (racially biased jury); Sheppard v. Maxwell, 384 U. S. 333, 362–363 (1966) (partial jury). Most analogous to the case before us, we have recognized that retrial is the appropriate remedy when a defendant is tried by a jury that does not reflect a fair cross-section of the community. See, e.g., Glasser v. United States, 315 U. S. 60, 85–87 (1942). There is no reason to conclude that trial before a jury drawn from the wrong geographic area demands a different remedy than trial before a jury drawn inadequately from within the community.

Failing to demonstrate that he is entitled to an acquittal based on text or precedent, Smith appeals to the historical background of the Venue and Vicinage Clauses. The history underlying the Clauses cannot justify an exception to the retrial rule.

In examining this history, the relevant starting point, as both parties agree, is the common-law “vicinage” right,