Gideon v. Wainwright, 372 U.S. 335 (1963), argued 15 Jan. 1963, decided 18 Mar. 1963 by vote of 9 to 0; black for the Court, Douglas, Clark, and Harlan concurring. Clarence Earl Gideon was charged with breaking and entering a poolroom with intent to commit a misdemeanor, a felony under Florida law. Being without funds, Gideon requested that counsel be appointed for him; the Florida trial court refused and Gideon conducted his own defense “about as well as could be expected from a layman” (p. 337). The jury returned a verdict of guilty. Gideon filed a habeas corpus petition in the Florida Supreme Court claiming that his federal constitutional rights had been abridged by the trial court's refusal to appoint counsel for him; the Florida Supreme Court denied relief and Gideon appealed in forma pauperis to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The Court appointed Abe Fortas, a prominent lawyer who later served as a justice, to argue Gideon's case and address whether Betts v. Brady (1942) should be overruled. Betts had held that, in state courts, the Fourteenth Amendment's Due Process Clause only required that appointed counsel be provided to indigents in special circumstances. However, the Court had not upheld a single denial of right to counsel under the Betts rule since its 1950 decision in Quicksal v. Michigan. The Court was looking for an opportunity to overrule Betts, and Gideon provided that opportunity.

A unanimous Court overruled Betts and held that the Sixth Amendment, as applied to the states by the Fourteenth Amendment, required that counsel be appointed to represent indigent defendants charged with serious offenses in state criminal trials. At his retrial, Gideon was represented by appointed counsel who uncovered new defense witnesses and discredited prosecution witnesses; a new jury acquitted Gideon.

In overruling Betts, Justice Hugo Black, for the majority, argued that the Court was “returning to … old precedents, sounder we believe than the new” (p. 334). In Powell v. Alabama (1932), the Court had held that when an indigent defendant is charged with a capital offense in a state court and is incapable of making his own defense, due process requires that counsel be appointed for him. It noted that “the right to be heard would be of little avail if it did not comprehend the right to be heard by counsel” (p. 68). In Johnson v. Zerbst (1938), the Court declared a right to appointed counsel in federal criminal cases. By 1942, thirty‐five states required that counsel be appointed to represent indigents in serious noncapital as well as capital cases. Indeed, in Gideon twenty‐two states filed an amicus curiae brief urging reversal of Betts and only three states, including Florida, argued that Betts should be upheld.

Gideon was widely interpreted as applying only to felony cases; but, in Argersinger v. Hamlin (1972), the Court extended the right to appointed counsel to misdemeanors when the defendant is sentenced to imprisonment. In another case decided the same day as Gideon, Douglas v. California, the Court held that the Equal Protection Clause conferred a right to appointed counsel for first appeals of right. In subsequent years, Gideon spawned two lines of cases. One series of cases deals with the Sixth Amendment right to counsel and at what stages of the criminal justice process the defendant must be allowed the benefit of counsel. Another line of cases acknowledges that the right to counsel implies the right to effective counsel and attempts to develop standards for determining when that right had been denied.

Today, most large cities and some states have public defender offices that provide counsel to indigents in criminal cases. In other regions, trial court judges appoint private attorneys to represent indigent defendants. A 1984 Department of Justice survey reported that two‐thirds of the nation's population is served by public defenders. Various studies have shown that a defendant's chance of being convicted is not significantly affected by whether he is represented by a public defender or private counsel, although defendants who proceed without counsel are significantly more likely to be convicted. Gideon, along with Mapp v. Ohio (1961), marked the beginning of the Court's “due process revolution,” which resulted in the constitutionalization of state criminal procedure and a series of only partially successful attempts to convince the Court to extend due process guarantees to civil and quasi‐legal proceedings.

See also Counsel, Right to; Sixth Amendment.

Bibliography

Anthony Lewis , Gideon's Trumpet (1964).

Susan E. Lawrence

GIDEON V. WAINWRIGHT

Gideon v. Wainwright, 372 U.S. 335, 83 S. Ct. 792, 9 L. Ed. 2d 799, is a 1963 U.S. Supreme Court decision that established an indigent criminal defendant's right, under the sixth amendment of the U.S. Constitution, to counsel in state criminal trials.

In 1961, Clarence Earl Gideon was charged in a Florida state court with breaking into and entering a poolroom with intent to commit a misdemeanor, a combination of offenses that constituted a felony under Florida law. He could not afford a lawyer, and he requested to have one appointed by the court. Nearly twenty years earlier, the U.S. Supreme Court had held in Betts v. Brady, 316 U.S. 455, 62 S. Ct. 1252, 86 L. Ed. 1595 (1942), that an ordinary person could do an adequate job of defending himself or herself. A court-appointed lawyer was required only if the defendant had mental or physical deficiencies, the case was unusually complicated, or the case involved "special circumstances." None of these exceptions applied to Gideon, the Florida trial court ruled, and thus his request for counsel was denied.

Gideon conducted his own defense and was found guilty of the charges. He then filed a handwritten petition with the Supreme Court of Florida, seeking to overturn his conviction on the ground that the trial court's refusal to appoint an attorney for him denied him the rights "guaranteed by the Constitution and the

bill of rights by the United States Government." The state supreme court denied Gideon's petition.

While in prison, Gideon, using law books available to him, drafted a petition for writ of certiorari to the U.S. Supreme Court. (The petition is the legal document in which a person requests the Supreme Court to hear an appeal. The Court has the discretion to accept or decline the appeal.) According to Anthony Lewis's acclaimed book on the case, Gideon's Trumpet (1964), in the handwritten petition Gideon stated that it "just was not fair" that he had no lawyer at his trial. The petition was granted, and abe fortas, who would later serve as an associate justice on the Court, was appointed to argue Gideon's case.

In a unanimous decision, the Supreme Court overruled Betts, holding the guarantee of counsel to be a fundamental right under the U.S. Constitution. The Court ruled that the due process clause of the fourteenth amendment required that the Sixth Amendment, which guarantees indigent defendants the right to counsel in federal criminal proceedings, be interpreted to include indigent defendants in state criminal trials. In his majority opinion, Justice hugo l. black wrote,"[R]eason and reflection require us to recognize that in our … system of criminal justice, any person hailed into court, who is too poor to hire a lawyer, cannot be assured a fair trial unless counsel is provided." Black further pointed out that the government hires attorneys to prosecute defendants, and individuals charged with crimes who are financially unable to hire attorneys to defend themselves, both "strong indications … that lawyers in criminal courts are necessities, not luxuries."

Gideon was later retried with a court-appointed lawyer representing him and was found not guilty.

Following Gideon, it was unclear whether the decision applied only to indigent defendants facing felony convictions and not to individuals charged with lesser crimes. Nine years later, that issue was clarified in Argersinger v. Hamlin, 407 U.S. 25, 92 S. Ct. 2006, 32 L. Ed. 2d 530 (1972). In Argersinger, the Supreme Court expanded its holding in Gideon, ruling that the Sixth Amendment right to appointed counsel extended to misdemeanor cases in which the person charged may face imprisonment, unless the defendant makes a "knowing and intelligent waiver" of his or her right to counsel. The Court concluded that an accused in a misdemeanor trial likewise has a strong need for representation and that Gideon should apply "to any criminal trial, where an accused is deprived of his liberty."

Argersinger was limited a few years later by Scott v. Illinois, 440 U.S. 367, 99 S. Ct. 1158, 59 L. Ed. 2d 383 (1979). In Scott, the Supreme Court held that the Sixth Amendment right to counsel extends only to cases where "actual imprisonment" is imposed, and not to cases where the "mere threat of imprisonment" exists (where the crime charged authorizes a possible jail sentence).

further readings

Lentine, John A. 2003. "Gideon v. Wainwright at Forty—Fulfilling the Promise?" American Journal of Trial Advocacy 26 (spring): 613–24.

Meares, Tracey L. 2003. "What's Wrong with Gideon?" University of Chicago Law Review 70 (winter): 215–31.

cross-references

Criminal Procedure; Due Process of Law; Public Defender.

GIDEON V. WAINWRIGHT.

GIDEON V. WAINWRIGHT. In Powell v. Alabama (1932) the U. S. Supreme Court held that state prosecution of indigent defendants for a capital crime without effective appointment of defense counsel violated the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States. But in Betts v. Brady (1942) the Court declined to compel the states to provide counsel in noncapital cases without "special circumstances" that would render a trial without counsel "fundamentally unfair." In 1962, the year Clarence Earl Gideon was prosecuted for burglary in a Florida state court, about a dozen states, including Florida, failed to meet the minimum constitutional requirements of Betts. Gideon was forced to defend himself and was convicted, despite his insistence at trial that "the U. S. Supreme Court says I am entitled to counsel." A year later, in Gideon v. Wainwright (372 U. S. 335), the Supreme Court agreed with him. Overruling Betts, it held that at least in all felony cases "any person …too poor to hire a lawyer cannot be assured a fair trial unless counsel is provided for him."

The political reaction to Gideon was generally favorable. Many states implemented the decision by establishing public defender systems or greatly expanding existing ones. The limitation of Gideon to felony cases was rejected in 1972, when the Supreme Court held that no person may be imprisoned for any offense without representation by counsel (Argersinger v. Hamlin, 407 U. S. 25, 37).

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Beaney, William Merritt. The Right to Counsel in American Courts. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1955.

Lewis, Anthony. Gideon's Trumpet. New York: Random House, 1964.

YaleKamisar/a. r.

See alsoBill of Rights in U. S. Constitution ; Constitution of the United States ; Due Process of Law ; Judicial Review ; Supreme Court .

Gideon v. Wainwright case decided in 1963 by the U.S. Supreme Court. Clarence Earl Gideon was convicted of a felony in a Florida court. He had defended himself after being denied a request for free counsel. The Supreme Court, in overturning his conviction, held that the right to counsel, guaranteed in federal trials by the Sixth Amendment to the Constitution, is fundamental to a fair trial. State failure to provide counsel for a defendant charged with a felony violated the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution. The decision was one of many by the Supreme Court under Chief Justice Earl Warren that protected the rights of accused criminals and extended the guarantees in the Bill of Rights to state actions. The holding was expanded in 1972 to require counsel for any defendant who would spend even one day in jail if found guilty.

Bibliography: See A. Lewis, Gideon's Trumpet (1964).