User:Varshanekkanti/Gideon v. Wainwright

Article Draft

[Added "Rise of the Civil Gideon Movement" as section 3.2 of and "Civil Gideon: Influence on Policy and Aid Provision as section 3.2.1 of the Implications section of the main article]

Rise of the Civil Gideon Movement

Poverty lawyering refers to the practice of providing low-income individuals with free or affordable counsel. After growing concern around the paucity of resources for the practice of poverty lawyering and the resource burden of case-by-case counsel determinations, state judges and legislators saw the benefit of ensuring the right to counsel for criminal defendants. Criminal defendants would be guaranteed the right to an attorney who can make legal arguments on their behalf; however, no corollary right extended protections to defendants facing civil offenses. As such, the Supreme Court decision in Gideon v. Wainwright marked a key transition. Previously, civil litigants were only able to access counsel based on the following three stringent criteria that resulted in few litigants receiving such counsel. The criteria included: whether the case had implications had any implications for a private corporation; whether their not receiving counsel would render the trial unfair or in some way compromised in procedure; and, whether the case impacted the Government's interests. With the onset of the Gideon decision, many more litigants were eligible for counsel, giving rise to the "Civil Gideon movement".

The Civil Gideon movement tackles the justice gap by calling for the right to counsel for low-income litigants in cases involving civil matters. In contrast to the self-representation movement, the historical Civil Gideon movement was founded on the premise that systemic representation by counsel “improves the accuracy of outcomes,...saves federal and state government money by helping to avoid the negative externalities caused by litigants wrongly losing their civil cases (such as increased use of shelters, emergency medical care, foster care, police, and public benefits), and increases the public’s faith and investment in the judicial process”.

While this movement has gained traction over time, many opponents to Civil Gideon have argued that this practice bears an unreasonable financial burden on states who have an inadequate understanding of the costs and resources needed for civil counsel. Others argue that the provision of publicly financed counsel can be viewed as constitutionally inadequate representation. One judge explained this phenomenon further in his statement that, post-Gideon, “many defendants were represented only by ‘walking violations of the Sixth Amendment’...No constitutional right is celebrated so much in the abstract and observed so little in reality as the right to counsel” . Since publicly financed counsel is not being supported financially by the client, there is no guarantee that the appointed counsel with be adequately trained and experienced in the legal domain they are representing.

Civil Gideon: Influence on Policy and Aid Provision

This movement along with the strong correlation between representation and equitable outcomes for low-income litigants in poverty lawyership scholarship has significantly influenced the policies in place surrounding legal representation, and continues to do so. For example, in 2006, the American Bar Association adopted Resolution 112A, urging jurisdictions to provide legal counsel “as a matter of right at public expense to low-income persons in those categories of adversarial proceedings where basic human needs are at stake”. Outside of influencing policy, the Civil Gideon movement has fueled approaches to legal aid that aim to alleviate the financial burden that civil litigants face in cases. Aid through lawyer substitutes has become a more prevalent practice, and this involves non-lawyer professionals that have the ability to assist clients in legal matters without the supervision of a certified attorney. Similarly, another practice that has gained prominence, especially with the onset of the Civil Gideon movement, is pro-bono legal aid. Pro-bono services involve providing legal services without fees in order to promote public good.