The Court has here under review the decision of a state court rejecting a claim of infirmity in a conviction for murder based on a constitutional ground raised for the first time in an extraordinary proceeding after the conviction had been affirmed on appeal. Respect for the State's administration of criminal justice requires a detailed narrative of the procedural course of this litigation and an adequate consideration of the legal factors relevant to our disposition.
Petitioner, a Negro, was convicted in Fulton County, Georgia, of the murder of a white man and sentenced to death. According to the allegations before us, the petit jury which convicted him was selected in the following manner:
On February 18, 1953, a judge of the Fulton County Superior Court selected from a box the names of prospective jurors. The names of white persons were on white tickets and the names of Negroes were on yellow tickets. The tickets were handed to a deputy sheriff, who in turn gave them to a deputy clerk for listing. The named jurors were subsequently summoned, some were excused, and the remaining 120 were available for the ten panels of twelve jurors each to serve in the trial of civil and criminal cases in the Fulton County Superior Court for the week of March 9, 1953. Of the 120 jurors, four were Negroes, and all four were assigned to the criminal docket.
On March 10, 1953, a panel of 48 of the 120 jurors was 'put upon' Williams at his trial. Thirteen jurors, including three of the four Negroes, were excused for cause. The State peremptorily challenged the fourth Negro, so that no Negroes served on the jury of twelve which was finally selected to try Williams.
The trial, which immediately followed the selection of the jury, lasted one day. Twenty-three witnesses appeared against Williams. His only defense was a short unsworn statement to the effect that he had not committed the crime and that he had been 'afraid' when he signed the written confession introduced against him.
Williams' court-appointed attorney filed a formal motion for new trial on March 27, 1953, and a more detailed amendment to the motion on June 29, 1953. The motion was overruled, and an appeal to the Georgia Supreme Court followed. On October 14, 1953, that court affirmed the judgment. 210 Ga. 207, 78 S.E.2d 521.
On December 1, 1953, Williams' counsel filed in the trial court an extraordinary motion for new trial under Ga. Code Ann., § 70-303. In this motion he alleged for the first time that Williams had been denied equal protection of the laws under the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution by the manner in which the petit jury had been selected, organized, impaneled and challenged. An affidavit by Williams accompanied the motion, stating that at the time of trial he had no knowledge of the methods used to select the jury. A similar affidavit by his counsel stated further that 'the same could not have been discovered by him (the counsel) in the exercise of ordinary diligence.' The law partner of Williams' counsel submitted a third affidavit to the effect that he had taken no part in the trial or in its preparation.
On January 18, 1954, the trial court dismissed the extraordinary motion for new trial. An appeal was taken to the Georgia Supreme Court. In the appeal, reliance was placed almost exclusively upon the case of Avery v. Georgia, 345 U.S. 559, 73 S.Ct. 891, 97 L.Ed. 1244, for the claim that Williams had been denied equal protection of the laws. The pertinence of that case to this turns on the time sequence in the two cases as well as on the relevant substantive facts.
Avery was convicted of rape on September 20, 1951, in Fulton County, Georgia-the same county in which Williams was tried a year and a half later. Avery's petit jury was drawn with yellow and white tickets precisely in the manner used later in the case of Williams. In Avery's case, no Negroes appeared on the list of 60 jurors put upon him at the trial, whereas here, four Negroes appeared on the list of 120 jurores from which Williams' jury was selected. Avery, however, challenged the array when the jury was put upon him; Williams did not. Avery's challenge was overruled, and after trial he appealed on the ground of discrimination in the selection of the jury. The Georgia Supreme Court disapproved of the use of yellow and white tickets but affirmed the judgment on the ground that no discrimination was actually shown.