County No. 4, 17,900 white people, 19,200 Negroes: “Negroes under our Constitution are not debarred from serving as jurors in Virginia, but owing to the nature and disposition of the Negro to follow and not lead, we seldom place them on trial juries. The number of colored jurors has decreased in the last ten years.”
County No. 5, 3,200 white people, 4,900 Negroes: “Negroes have for a number of years been serving on the juries in this county, and, as far as I have been able to learn, have generally given satisfactory service.... There is hardly ever a jury drawn without some Negroes being on it. Of course, the judge selects those Negroes who are best qualified for the service.... Naturally, the number of Negro jurors is not near so large as that of the whites, for the reason ... that all jurors are selected with reference to their qualifications.”
County No. 6, 4,000 white people, 4,800 Negroes: “... we never have any Negroes on juries in my county. Haven’t had any for about fifteen years....”
County No. 7, 10,000 white people, 13,000 Negroes: “... Negroes do not serve on juries in this county, and it has been about twenty years since they did jury service here.”
County No. 8, 2,300 white people, 4,400 Negroes: “Since the adoption of the new Constitution for this State ... Negroes no longer serve as jurors in this county. Prior to that time they appeared regularly in our courts, and made good jurors in the civil as well as criminal business. Of course, in selecting them, only the best of their race were chosen. And I can’t recall an instance, with an experience of sixteen years as clerk of the courts, that any objection was ever raised against them as jurors.”
County No. 9, 5,500 white people, 5,600 Negroes: “We don’t have colored men on jury in this county.”
County No. 10, 9,000 white people, 13,600 Negroes: “Negroes are not allowed to serve on juries in this county.”
County No. 11, 1,100 white people, 3,700 Negroes: “We have not had any Negroes to serve on the jury in this county for twelve or fifteen years, and when they did, they gave very poor satisfaction.”
Summary: With such incomplete statistics, conclusions as to the actual service of the Negro as a juror can hardly be more than guesses. Some of the clerks of court say that the number of Negro jurors in their counties is increasing; others, that it is decreasing. Some say that race does not come into the consideration of fitness for jury service; others, that Negroes are not allowed on juries at all. Some say that Negro jurors have given satisfaction; others, that they have been scarcely more than figureheads following the lead of white jurors. Several of the clerks think that Negro litigants are reluctant to have Negro jurors sit on their cases. Some feel that Negro jurors are more prone to convict than white jurors are. It is undoubtedly true that there are not as many Negroes qualified for jury service under the laws of the Southern States as there were twenty-five years ago, say. Usually one must be an elector to be qualified for jury service. The great majority of the Negroes have been unable to satisfy the suffrage tests and have been disfranchised. They are, consequently, not electors and not eligible to serve as jurors. Hence, if the selection of jurors is conducted with absolute impartiality, there will be comparatively few Negroes retained.