233 MARSHALL, J., dissenting other prisoners might have made a tactical choice not to raise the underlying issue, is just not responsive to his argument.8 The Solicitor General has urged on us policy considerations that at least bear on the decision whether the Government's interest in enforcing an airtight system of forfeitures with respect to claims going to the composition of the grand jury is greater than its interest in enforcing a similar system with respect to claims going to the admission of illegally seized evidence. He argues that the crucial difference lies in the ease with which the prosecution can reconstruct its case on a proper basis. It is relatively easy, he says, to remedy the return of an indictment by an unconstitutionally composed grand jury. All that must be done is to convene a properly composed grand jury. But if the result of a finding of error is to wash out not just the indictment but also an entire trial, that error is very costly to legitimate interests in economy. Thus, failure to raise a claim relating to the composition of the grand jury prior to trial may entail large costs. In contrast, the Solicitor General suggests, failure to raise a claim before trial relating to the use of the fruits of an unconstitutional search is not quite so costly. Whenever the finding that the search was unlawful is made, the prosecution will have to reconstruct its case rather substantially. New witnesses may have to be found, and more emphasis must be placed upon the testimony of witnesses that is not tainted by the search. There is, on this view, a very important reason for enforcing an airtight system of foreclosures 8 The difficulties in proving that a tactical choice was made not to raise the grand jury claim are, so far as I can tell, no different from proving that a tactical choice was made not to make a motion to suppress or to object to a prosecutor's comments on a defendant's failure to testify, both decisions to which this Court has applied the traditional test of waiver. Kaufman v. United States, 394 U. S. 217 (1969); Camp v. Arkansas, 404 U. S. 69 (1971). MARSHALL, J., dissenting 411 U.S. where the claim is that an easily remedied error has been made it is simply much more costly to require retrials in those cases. That argument undoubtedly has some force. But it also goes too far, for it is inconsistent with the power given to reverse a conviction on the basis of plain error to which no objection had been made. Fed. Rule Crim. Proc. 52 (b). An improper argument by a prosecutor in his closing argument may be plain error, for example. Doty v. United States, 416 F. 2d 887, 890-891 (CA10 1968), and cases cited. Yet timely objection might have cut off the improper argument at a point when an admonition to the jury to disregard it would adequately protect the defendant's rights. A system that permits reversal on the ground of plain error to which no objection had been made but prohibits reversal on the ground that timely objection to the composition of the grand jury had not been made by a defendant who did not intentionally relinquish his right to object, and that justifies the latter rule in terms of governmental interests in economy, seems to me perverse. The Solicitor General's argument is unpersuasive, ultimately, not alone for the reasons just given, but also because the legitimate governmental interests that support & strict system of forfeitures with respect to claims about the composition of the grand jury are, in my view, outweighed by other important public interests. First, and most important in this case, we must assure that no one is excluded from participation in important demo 9 Since nothing distinguishes this case from others involving, for example, claims of illegal searches, Kaufman v. United States, supra, in terms of the governmental interest in finality in criminal litigation, I do not discuss that interest here. The Government must be able to assert interests peculiar to grand jury claims in order to show that those interests outweigh countervailing public interests served by leaving those claims open to later determination. 233 MARSHALL, J., dissenting cratic institutions like the grand jury because of race. Second, convicted offenders will be more amenable to rehabilitation when they know that all their claims of unfairness have been considered, unless they deliberately refrained from raising them at an earlier point. Finally, providing the opportunity to raise such claims at any point in the process, so long as the offender did not willingly conceal them for strategic reasons, helps guarantee that the process of criminal justice is fair, and does so without benefiting someone who was delinquent in his attempts to preserve the fairness of the process. "For over 90 years, it has been established that a criminal conviction of a Negro cannot stand under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment if it is based on an indictment of a grand jury from which Negroes were excluded by reason of their race. Strauder v. West Virginia, 100 U. S. 303 (1880); Neal v. Delaware, 103 U. S. 370 (1881)." Alexander v. Louisiana, 405 U. S. 625, 628 (1972). "People excluded from juries because of their race are as much aggrieved as those indicted and tried by juries chosen under a system of racial exclusion." Carter v. Jury Comm'n, 396 U. S., at 329. When it fulfills its proper function, the grand jury is a central institution of our democracy, restraining the discretion of prosecutors to institute criminal proceedings. Cf. United States v. Dionisio, 410 U. S. 1, 17 (1973); Wood v. Georgia, 370 U. S. 375, 390 (1962). Although there may be other ways to vindicate the right of every qualified citizen to participate in the grand jury without discrimination based on race, Carter v. Jury Comm'n, supra, this Court has consistently allowed criminal defendants to assert the rights of excluded groups without requiring that they show prejudice in the particular case. Ballard v. United States, 329 U. S. 187, 195 (1946). This is contrary to the general rule that no one has standing to assert the rights of others, Moose Lodge No. 107 v. MARSHALL, J., dissenting 411 U.S. Irvis, 407 U. S. 163, 166-167 (1972). It is justified by the importance of assuring every opportunity to raise claims of unconstitutional discrimination in the selection of grand juries. That principle alone, in my view, would warrant a very restrictive view of attempts to foreclose the opportunity to raise such claims. But there is more. Offenders who have been indicted by unconstitutionally composed grand juries undeniably are aggrieved. There is a paramount public interest that the process of criminal justice be fair. As we said in Kaufman v. United States, 394 U. S., at 226, "The provision of federal collateral remedies rests . . . upon a recognition that adequate protection of constitutional rights relating to the criminal trial process requires the continuing availability of a mechanism for relief." The function of collateral relief "has been to provide a prompt and efficacious remedy for whatever society deems to be intolerable restraints. Its root principle is that in a civilized society, government must always be accountable to the judiciary for a man's imprisonment: if the imprisonment cannot be shown to conform with the fundamental requirements of law, the individual is entitled to his immediate release." Fay v. Noia, 372 U. S., at 401-402 (emphasis added). The traditional scope of collateral relief requires, again, that prisoners be afforded the broadest possible opportunity to present claims that their detention is the result of an unconstitutional procedure.1 10 I do not deny that there is an interest in enforcing compliance with reasonable procedural requirements by a system of forfeitures, so that claims will be raised at a time when they may easily be determined and necessary 10 Indeed, this Court has suggested that any narrowing of those opportunities would itself be an unconstitutional suspension of the writ of habeas corpus, Art. I, §9, cl. 2. Fay v. Noia, 372 U. S. 391, 406 (1963); Sanders v. United States, 373 U. S. 1, 11-12 (1963). 233 MARSHALL, J., dissenting corrective action taken. But do not believe that the system of forfeitures must be so comprehensive and rigid that a person may not raise a claim of discrimination in the selection of the grand jury even though he made no deliberate, informed choice to forgo the claim. Such a system too grievously affects other important interests. With these principles in mind, the resolution of this case is not difficult. Rule 12 (b) (2) provides that "the court for cause shown may grant relief from the waiver." I would hold that, when a prisoner shows that his failure to raise a claim of discrimination in the selection of the grand jury was not an intentional relinquishment of a known right, he has shown cause for relief from the waiver." The prior cases, which Rule 12 (b)(2) is said to have continued, did not examine in any detail the circumstances in which failure to object was held to constitute a waiver. See, e. g., United States v. Gale, 109 U. S. 65 (1883); In re Wilson, 140 U. S. 575 (1891). Cf. Kohl v. Lehlback, 160 U. S. 293 (1895). It is clear that in none of those cases did the prisoner show that his failure to object was not an intentional relinquishment of a known right.12 11 I do not understand the Court's contention that this is a "liberal requirement." It is true of course that waiver will not be presumed from a silent record. Cf. Carnley v. Cochran, 369 U. S. 506, 516 (1962). But in a case like this, the record is not silent; it shows that the defendant did not object to the composition of the grand jury. (I do not quarrel with the Court's reliance on the finding made below that, despite Davis' allegations, no pretrial objection was made.) Thus, the burden is on him to show that he did not know of his right to object to the composition of the grand jury, or that, knowing of his rights, he nonetheless did not exercise them because, for example, he feared that to do so would generate hostility that would adversely affect his chances of acquittal. 12 In a related setting, this Court has interpreted language that might be thought to preclude later claims in a manner similar to that I would adopt here. Sanders v. United States, supra, involved the question whether failure to raise a claim in a pre |