Prosecutors may not use peremptory challenges to dismiss jurors based on their race. Decided April 30, 1986 (argued December 12, 1985). Opinion of the Court: Powell Dissenting: Burger, Rehnquist. Applied: the Fourteenth Amendment → go there Topic: Discrimination based on race and ethnicity. Batson v. Kentucky, 476 U.S. 79 (1986), is a landmark decision of the United States Supreme Court ruling that a prosecutor's use of a peremptory challenge in a criminal case—the dismissal of jurors without stating a valid cause for doing so—may not be used to exclude jurors based solely on their race. The Court ruled that this practice violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The case gave rise to the term Batson challenge, an objection to a peremptory challenge based on the standard established by the Supreme Court's decision in this case. Subsequent jurisprudence has resulted in the extension of Batson to civil cases and cases where jurors are excluded on the basis of sex. Wiki link