THE LAND OF NO LAWYER

You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. You have a right to an attorney, and to have that attorney present during questioning. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be appointed for you free of charge.

Those are the standard Miranda warnings, the rights and guarantees all individuals have pursuant to the Fifth and Sixth Amendments to the United States Constitution. In a 1966 case before the United States Supreme Court known as Miranda vs. Arizona, the Court ruled that before an individual in police custody can be questioned by the police, that individual has to be advised by the police that he or she had the above-referenced rights. Any evidence provided or statements made by an individual in the absence of Miranda warnings are inadmissible in a court of law.

The right to an attorney mentioned in the standard Miranda warnings is part of a set of guarantees set forth in the Sixth Amendment, which includes the following language, “In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to…have the assistance of counsel for his defense.” In 1963, in the case of Gideon vs. Wainwright, the United Stated State Supreme Court ruled that all indigent defendants charged with a felony have the right to have an attorney appointed to represent them, free of charge, and paid for by the state that seeks to prosecute them.

Since the Supreme Court’s Gideon decision, as it has come to be known, every state and territory under the jurisdiction of the United States has provided what are known as public defenders (free lawyers) to indigent defendants to comply with the above-stated requirements of the Sixth Amendment, except one – the state of Louisiana. That’s because the Louisiana Legislature, controlled by fiscally conservative Republicans I might add, has decided not to provide sufficient funding for the public defender’s office in New Orleans where an overwhelming majority of the state’s criminal cases are handled. The result is that hundred, perhaps thousands of indigent defendants charged with felonies are imprisoned without the opportunity to have their detention challenged by an attorney. To rectify this injustice, the American Civil Liberties Union filed suit in federal court the other day against the State of Louisiana and its Legislature.

It’s popular amongst a certain crowd (most notably law-and-order Republicans with their hands on the public purse strings) to condemn the notion of appropriating taxpayer dollars to guarantee that an accused has access to the rights guaranteed by our Federal Constitution, unless it’s a fellow Republican politician in the dock, but there is no higher responsibility for a Legislature than doing everything in their power to uphold Constitutional rights. Clearly, the Louisiana Legislature has thumbed its nose at the Sixth Amendment long enough and the federal courts will intervene to force compliance with its guarantees. No man or woman should be above the law, and you can add a Legislature to that list as well.