ABSTRACT
Anabel Hernandez maintained that Spanish language ability was closely related to ethnicity and that as a result, the exclusion of Latino potential jurors because they speak Spanish violates the equal protection clause. The decision in Hernandez v. New York has important and negative implications for Latinas/os. This chapter focuses on the implications of Hernandez and the continual underrepresentation and systematic exclusion of Mexicans and Latinas/os from grand and petite juries in the United States. The argument in Hernandez v. New York that the jurors were not excluded because they were Latino or bilingual is unpersuasive because there is, as the Petitioner maintained, a very close relationship between bilingualism and Latino ethnicity. In Hernandez v. Texas, the state of Texas stipulated that no person with a Mexican or Latin American surname had ever served on a jury commission, grand jury, or petit jury in Jackson County.
