Gideon V. WainwrightEssay Preview: Gideon V. WainwrightReport this essayGideon v. WainwrightFactsDefendant Clarence Earl Gideon was charged with breaken and entering a poolroom with intent to commit a misdemeanor. Defendant was denied request for appointed counsel on the grounds that under the laws of Florida only a defendant charged with a capital offense was entitled to such an appointment. Defendant was without funds. Defendant conducted his own defense. Defendant was convicted and sentenced to imprisonment of five years in the state prison. Defendant filed in the Supreme Court of Florida the present habeas corpus petition, attacking his conviction on the ground that his federal constitutional rights were violated by the trial courts refusal to appoint counsel. The appeal was denied by the Florida Supreme Court. The United States Supreme Court granted certiorari. Court appointed counsel to represent Gideon and requested both sides to discuss in their briefs and oral arguments the following “should this Court holding Bett v. Bradley, 316 U.S. 455, be considered”.
IssueThe issue was whether or not defendant constitutional rights were violated by the Florida trial court. Defendant argued that he was denied the rights of the 4th, 5th, and 14th amendments of the Bill of Rights. The issues in the Gideon v. Wainwright case has plagued the United States court before. In Betts v. Brady, 316 U.S. 455, defendant claimed that he had been unconstitutionally denied the right to have counsel appointed to assist him are very similar to the Gideon to the facts upon which Gideon here bases his federal constitutional claim. Defendants federal constitutional right to counsel in a state court has been an on going source of controversy and litigation in both state and federal courts.
[Footnote 2/18]
This case, in the United States Supreme Court, is an ongoing case and we need clarification and changes in our laws since the Gideon to the facts on which the Gideon applies. On March 7, 1982, the Court of Appeals in the Northern District of New York ruled that, despite the defendant’s claim that the Supreme Court had established the constitutional rights of defendants, “each of those constitutional rights” were not violated by the Florida trial court. The decision in this case is, in short, a reversal of the order in this case and its subsequent findings.
In making the decision, the Court of Appeals stated:
“The facts of this case are, in fact, a matter of state law. We must never allow common law to lead to uniformity. For that to mean uniformity, one must be willing to grant some type of constitutional right, at least in some form.”
[Footnote 2/19]
This is a constitutional issue in this case but the Court of Appeals must accept the facts of this case. Thus in a brief fact summary we found that by applying common law the state court was not violating the constitutional rights of the individual defendants. We conclude that, even if the Florida appellate court’s order was unconstitutional under Florida law, there was no basis for holding that it was unconstitutional under Florida law. We do believe the facts of this case provide a basis for resolving the issue before us by applying common law to a defendant in an analogous state court case.
JUSTICE SOUTER ( concurring and dissenting ) delivered the opinion of the Court.
Gideon v. Wainwright, supra, at 449 F.2d at 734. The constitutional question here is whether a defendant in an individual state court should be afforded the same protection that a defendant has in the state court which is established under common law, and the court ruling that defendant in this case is not.
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Citizens have a strong interest in ensuring that the laws of each state allow citizens to know their rights under the Fourteenth Amendment. For the purpose of this case the federal constitutional right to counsel has a special meaning under our United States Supreme Court. Annotation The case is cited in the N.D.R. v. Evans, supra, at 408 U. S. 527-528 (Stevens, J., dissenting); United States v. Davis, supra, at 410 U. S. 857-858 (Gentry, J., dissenting). We do not find common law to justify the state’s decision to grant the rights of individuals to counsel in a state court-based case involving the defendant. See, e.g., United States v. Wigner, 409 U. S. 533-