Douglas v. California
 | |
| Douglas v. California | |
| Reference: 372 U.S. 353 | |
| Term: 1962 | |
| Important Dates | |
| Argued: April 17, 1962 Reargued: January 16, 1963 Decided: March 18, 1963 | |
| Outcome | |
| California Second District Court of Appeal vacated and remanded | |
| Majority | |
| Chief Justice Earl Warren • Hugo Black • William Brennan • William O. Douglas • Byron White • Arthur Goldberg | |
| Concurring | |
| None | |
| Dissenting | |
| Tom Clark • John M. Harlan • Potter Stewart | |
Douglas v. California is a case decided on March 18, 1963, by the U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled that states had to appoint counsel to indigent criminal defendants for appeals if state law permitted an appeal as a matter of right. The case concerned a California law that allowed state appellate courts to reject counsel requests made by indigent defendants if an investigation found the defendant and appellate court would not benefit from appointed counsel. The court vacated and remanded the California Second District Court of Appeal's decision, holding that the California law violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment.[1][2]
Why it matters: The court ruled in Douglas that states had to appoint counsel to indigent criminal defendants for appeals if state law permitted an appeal as a matter of right
Background
The petitioners in this case were Bennie Will Meyes and William Douglas. Both men were tried jointly in a California court on 13 felony charges, including "robbery, assault with a deadly weapon, and assault with intent to commit murder." Both men were indigent defendants and were represented by a lone public defender, who, at the start of the trial, petitioned for a continuance, "stating that the case was very complicated, that he was not as prepared as he felt he should be because he was handling a different defense every day, and that there was a conflict of interest between the petitioners requiring the appointment of separate counsel for each of them." The motion was denied.
After the motion for a continuance was denied, Meyes and Douglas petitioned to dismiss their public defender, claiming that counsel was unprepared. The judge granted this motion, but denied the petitioners' request that new counsel be appointed. Meyes and Douglas subsequently petitioned that they be tried separately and for a continuance now that they would proceed uncounseled. These motions were also denied. Both men proceeded as pro se defendants during the trial and were convicted by a jury on each of the 13 counts.
As a matter of right, both men appealed to the California Second District Court of Appeal. Both men requested counsel for their appeal, but the court denied this request because the court had "gone through" the lower court record and determined that "no good whatever could be served by appointment of counsel." This determination was made, in part, by reference to a California law that allowed state appellate courts to independently investigate counsel requests made by indigent defendants to "determine whether it would be of advantage to the defendant or helpful to the appellate court to have counsel appointed ... After such investigation, appellate courts should appoint counsel if in their opinion it would be helpful to the defendant or the court, and should deny the appointment of counsel only if in their judgment such appointment would be of no value to either the defendant or the court."
Both men subsequently appealed the decision to deny counsel to the California Supreme Court, which denied the requests without a hearing. The men then appealed for a writ of certiorari to the U.S. Supreme Court.[1][2]
Oral argument
Oral argument was first held on April 17, 1962. The case was reargued on January 16, 1963, and was decided on March 18, 1963.[1][2]
Decision
The judgment of the California Second District Court of Appeal was vacated and remanded.[1]
Opinions
Opinion of the court
Writing for a six-justice majority, Justice William O. Douglas, who had no relation to the petitioner in this case, presented the court's rationale within the context of equal protection.
Justice Douglas noted the court's agreement with Justice Roger Traynor, who felt the denial of counsel in Meyes and Douglas' appeal was discriminatory. Justice Douglas stated, "We agree, however, with Justice Traynor of the California Supreme Court, who said that the '[d]enial of counsel on appeal [to an indigent] would seem to be a discrimination at least as invidious as that condemned in Griffin v. Illinois ...' In Griffin v. Illinois ... we held that a State may not grant appellate review in such a way as to discriminate against some convicted defendants on account of their poverty ... Here the issue is whether or not an indigent shall be denied the assistance of counsel on appeal. In either case the evil is the same: discrimination against the indigent. For there can be no equal justice where the kind of an appeal a man enjoys 'depends on the amount of money he has.'"[1]
Justice Douglas proceeded to identify the particular aspects of the California procedure that, in the court's view, violated the equal protection of the laws,[1]
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In spite of California's forward treatment of indigents, under its present practice the type of an appeal a person is afforded in the District Court of Appeal hinges ... upon whether or not he can pay for the assistance of counsel. If he can the appellate court passes on the merits of his case only after having the full benefit of written briefs and oral argument by counsel. If he cannot the appellate court is forced to prejudge the merits before it can even determine whether counsel should be provided. At this stage in the proceedings only the barren record speaks for the indigent, and, unless the printed pages show that an injustice has been committed, he is forced to go without a champion on appeal. Any real chance he may have had of showing that his appeal has hidden merit is deprived him when the court decides on an ex parte examination of the record that the assistance of counsel is not required. [3] |
” |
For Justice Douglas and the majority, this rule of procedure in practice violated petitioners' rights of equal protection.
Justice Douglas clarified that the ruling only pertained to obligatory appeals under state law.
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We are dealing only with the first appeal, granted as a matter of right to rich and poor alike, ... from a criminal conviction. We need not now decide whether California would have to provide counsel for an indigent seeking a discretionary hearing from the California Supreme Court after the District Court of Appeal had sustained his conviction ... where the merits of the one and only appeal an indigent has as of right are decided without benefit of counsel, we think an unconstitutional line has been drawn between rich and poor. When an indigent is forced to run this gauntlet of a preliminary showing of merit, the right to appeal does not comport with fair procedure ... The present case, where counsel was denied petitioners on appeal, shows that the discrimination is not between "possibly good and obviously bad cases," but between cases where the rich man can require the court to listen to argument of counsel before deciding on the merits, but a poor man cannot. There is lacking that equality demanded by the Fourteenth Amendment where the rich man, who appeals as of right, enjoys the benefit of counsel's examination into the record, research of the law, and marshalling of arguments on his behalf, while the indigent, already burdened by a preliminary determination that his case is without merit, is forced to shift for himself. The indigent, where the record is unclear or the errors are hidden, has only the right to a meaningless ritual, while the rich man has a meaningful appeal. [3] |
” |
Dissents
Two justices, Justice Tom Clark and Justice John M. Harlan, filed dissenting opinions. Justice Potter Stewart joined Justice Harlan's dissent.
Justice Clark's dissent
Justice Clark argued that California's law satisfied equal protection and went beyond the requirements that federal procedure provided to indigent defendants.[1]
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With this new fetish for indigency the Court piles an intolerable burden on the State's judicial machinery. Indeed, if the Court is correct it may be that we should first clean up our own house. We have afforded indigent litigants much less protection than has California. Last Term we received over 1,200 in forma pauperis applications in none of which had we appointed attorneys or required a record. Some were appeals of right. Still we denied the petitions or dismissed the appeals on the moving papers alone. At the same time we had hundreds of paid cases in which we permitted petitions or appeals to be filed with not only records but briefs by counsel, after which they were disposed of in due course. On the other hand, California furnishes the indigent a complete record and if counsel is requested requires its appellate courts either to (1) appoint counsel or (2) make an independent investigation of that record and determine whether it would be of advantage to the defendant or helpful to the court to have counsel appointed ... There is an old adage which my good Mother used to quote to me, i.e., 'People who live in glass houses had best not throw stones.' [3] |
” |
Justice Harlan's dissent
Justice Harlan, joined by Justice Stewart, disagreed with both the court's holding as well as the court's reliance on equal protection.[1]
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Laws such as these do not deny equal protection to the less fortunate for one essential reason: the Equal Protection Clause does not impose on the States 'an affirmative duty to lift the handicaps flowing from differences in economic circumstances.' ... To so construe it would be to read into the Constitution a philosophy of leveling that would be foreign to many of our basic concepts of the proper relations between government and society. The State may have a moral obligation to eliminate the evils of poverty, but it is not required by the Equal Protection Clause to give to some whatever others can afford. Thus it should be apparent that the present case ... is not one properly regarded as arising under this clause. California does not discriminate between rich and poor in having a uniform policy permitting everyone to appeal and to retain counsel, and in having a separate rule dealing only with the standards for the appointment of counsel for those unable to retain their own attorneys. The sole classification established by this rule is between those cases that are believed to have merit and those regarded as frivolous. And, of course, no matter how far the state rule might go in providing counsel for indigents, it could never be expected to satisfy an affirmative duty - if one existed - to place the poor on the same level as those who can afford the best legal talent available. [3] |
” |
Justice Harlan argued that the case should have been evaluated solely on the basis of whether or not the denial of counsel violated Meyes and Douglas' rights of due process. He said the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment did not require states to allow appeals and argued the denial of counsel did not violate the defendants' due process rights. "First, appellate review is in itself not required by the Fourteenth Amendment ... Second, the kinds of questions that may arise on appeal are circumscribed by the record of the proceedings that led to the conviction; they do not encompass the large variety of tactical and strategic problems that must be resolved at the trial. Third, as California applies its rule, the indigent appellant receives the benefit of expert and conscientious legal appraisal of the merits of his case on the basis of the trial record, and whether or not he is assigned counsel, is guaranteed full consideration of his appeal. It would be painting with too broad a brush to conclude that under these circumstances an appeal is just like a trial."[1]
Finally, Justice Harlan agreed with Justice Clark that due process concerns could be raised with the court's own rules of procedure regarding indigent defendants.[1]
See also
External links
Footnotes
- ↑ 1.00 1.01 1.02 1.03 1.04 1.05 1.06 1.07 1.08 1.09 1.10 1.11 Supreme Court of the United States (via Findlaw), "Douglas v. California," accessed August 18, 2022
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 2.2 Oyez.org, "Douglas v. California," accessed August 18, 2022
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 3.3 Note: This text is quoted verbatim from the original source. Any inconsistencies are attributable to the original source.
