The Linking of Voting and Jury Service in Ohio

by Judge James L. Kimbler

Ohio has long linked voting and jury service. In 1803, the year that Ohio was admitted to the Union, the Ohio General Assembly passed a law that required jurors to have the same qualifications as voters. This meant that jurors were drawn from those residents who had the qualifications of voters. Those qualifications were found in Article IV, Section One, which read as follows:

section 1. In all elections, all white male inhabitants above the age of twenty-one years, having resided in the State one year next preceding the election, and who have paid or are charged with a State or county tax, shall enjoy the right of an elector; but no person shall be entitled to vote, except in the county or district in which he shall actually reside at the time of the election.

The Constitution of 1851 changed the qualifications for voting. Voting qualifications were found in Article V, Section One of the 1851 Constitution, which read as follows:

Section One. Every white male citizen of the United States of the age of twenty-one years, who shall have been a resident of the state one year next preceding the election, and of the county, township, or ward, in which he resides, such time as may be provided by law, shall have the qualifications of an elector and shall be entitled to vote in all elections.

Note that while only white males over 21 could vote, they no longer had to pay either county or state taxes. Since Ohio continued to link voting and jury service, this meant that the number of people who could serve on juries expanded with the change in voting qualifications.

Although the Constitution of 1851 was not amended until 1912, when Ohio's voters passed a series of amendments, the Civil War and the subsequent passage of the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments changed the voting qualifications in Ohio. As a result of the passage of these amendments, both the number of voters and the number of potential jurors expanded. No longer could Ohio limit either voting or jury service to white males.

The next expansion of those eligible for jury service came when women got the right to vote with the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920. Since Ohio law required jurors to be drawn from those who were eligible to vote, the adoption of the Nineteenth Amendment meant that women were now eligible to serve as jurors.

So, by the early 1920s jurors were all residents of Ohio who were 21 years of age or older and who were eligible to vote. This was how things stayed until the adoption of the Twenty Sixth Amendment. That amendment gave the right to vote to all those who were 18 years of age or older and prohibited states from denying such persons the right to vote. Since Ohio law required jurors to have the same qualifications as voters, this meant that 18 year olds could serve on juries.

In 1985, the Ohio General Assembly authorized counties to draw jurors from a list of eligible voters and a list of residents with valid Ohio driver licenses. This was the first time since 1803 that Ohio had allowed residents other than those eligible to vote to serve on a jury. Only one county, Montgomery, has adopted this method. In the other 87 counties, including Medina, jury lists are drawn from voter lists.

So, in Ohio since 1803 there has been a constant expansion of those who are permitted to serve as jurors. Sometimes the expansion was because of changes in the Ohio Constitution and at other times it was because of the passage of amendments to the United States Constitution. Always, though, there has been expansion and never contraction of those who can serve on a jury.