WASHINGTON — Gay men and lesbians may not be excluded from juries based on their sexual orientation, the federal appeals court in San Francisco ruled on Tuesday.

During jury selection, lawyers are generally permitted to exclude — or strike — a fixed number of potential jurors without stating a reason. But in 1986, in Batson v. Kentucky, the Supreme Court made an exception for race, requiring lawyers to provide a nondiscriminatory explanation if challenged. Eight years later the justices extended that requirement to gender.

The Supreme Court has never addressed strikes based on sexual orientation. On Tuesday, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit became the first federal appeals court to bar such strikes. Its decision is at odds with one from the federal appeals court in St. Louis, making review by the Supreme Court more likely.

“Gays and lesbians have been systematically excluded from the most important institutions of self-governance,” Judge Stephen R. Reinhardt wrote for a unanimous three-judge panel. “Strikes exercised on the basis of sexual orientation continue this deplorable tradition of treating gays and lesbians as undeserving of participation in our nation’s most cherished rites and rituals.”