I’m surprised that Thomas agree with this. Unanimous juries is not in the constitution.
Thomas vote was probably moved by this language from the opinion: “Wherever we might look to determine what the term ‘trial by an impartial jury trial’ meant at the time of the Sixth Amendment’s adoption—whether it’s the common law, state practices in the founding era, or opinions and treatises written soon afterward—the answer is unmistakable,” Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote in an opinion. “A jury must reach a unanimous verdict in order to convict.”
The idea is basically that free people judge each other outside the “criminal framework” (substantive laws) created by the government. The government provides a procedural framork, venue, structure and so on, but the decision to brand a person a criminal is for his peers, not for the government.
The government HATES this. It does not like “free people” in fact. It likes people to THINK they are free, even when they are not.