In Ross v. Oklahoma, the U.S Supreme Court ruled that an error in a state trial court's application of its own law does not necessarily equate to a violation of federal due process rights. The case involved Glenn Burton Ake who was convicted for first-degree murder and sentenced to death by an Oklahoma jury. His attorney argued that one juror should have been dismissed for cause because he had already formed an opinion about Ake’s guilt before hearing any evidence, but the judge denied this request. Instead, defense counsel used one of his peremptory challenges (a limited number of opportunities to reject potential jurors without stating a reason) to remove this juror from consideration. On appeal, Ake claimed his Fourteenth Amendment right to due process was violated because he had been forced "to waste" a peremptory challenge on someone who should have been removed for cause by the judge. The Supreme Court disagreed with him in 1988 ruling that while states are required under federal law to provide defendants with basic tools necessary for adequate defense or appeal when they cannot afford them themselves; there is no constitutional requirement mandating how these tools must be provided or allocated among defendants' various needs.

In the dissenting opinion for Ross v. Oklahoma, Justice Marshall argued that the majority's decision was inconsistent with previous rulings on fair trial rights and jury selection. He contended that an impartial jury is a fundamental aspect of a fair trial, which includes not only jurors who are unbiased but also those who can be removed for cause if they show clear signs of bias. In this case, he believed one juror should have been dismissed due to his stated inability to disregard the defendant's prior conviction during deliberations - something which could unduly influence his judgment in this separate case. The fact that defense counsel had to use one of their peremptory challenges (which allow attorneys to reject potential jurors without stating a reason) instead meant they were effectively denied their full complement of such challenges; thus infringing upon their ability to shape the final jury composition as desired or needed based on strategy or intuition about other potential biases among remaining candidates.