Betts v. Brady

316 U.S. 455 (1942), argued 13–14 Apr. 1942, decided 1 June 1942 by vote of 6 to 3; Roberts for the Court, black in dissent. After indictment for robbery, Betts asked the trial court to appoint an attorney to assist in his defense. The trial judge refused; Betts represented himself and was convicted. While incarcerated, Betts filed habeas corpus petitions. Lower courts rejected these petitions, and Betts filed a certiorari petition with the U.S. Supreme Court.

At issue before the Court was Betts's claim that the trial court's refusal to extend the right to counsel to noncapital felonies constituted a violation of the Sixth Amendment provision as incorporated by the Fourteenth Amendment (see Incorporation Doctrine). In his opinion for the Court, Justice Owen J. Roberts rejected Betts's claim, concluding that most states did not require appointment of counsel for fair trials and that the circumstances of his case did not suggest that such assistance was necessary. The Court distinguished Betts's situation from that of an earlier Court decision, Powell v. Alabama (1932), where young African‐American defendants were charged with a capital offense and where the Court concluded that appointed counsel was essential for a fair trial.

Justice Hugo Black was joined in dissent by Justices William O. Douglas and Frank Murphy. Black emphasized that Betts's petition would have been granted had he been a defendant in federal criminal proceedings, that the petitioner was entitled to the procedural protection provided by the federal Constitution, and that the right to counsel was fundamental to criminal due process.

Betts v. Brady was ultimately overruled by Gideon v. Wainwright (1963), where the minority position in Betts was unanimously adopted by the Court.

See also Counsel, Right to; Due Process, Procedural.

— Susette M. Talarico

• 316 U.S. 455 (1942)
• Vote: 6–3
• For the Court: Roberts
• Dissenting: Black, Douglas, and Murphy

Smith Betts, a 43-year-old unemployed man, was indicted for robbing a store in Carroll County, Maryland. He pleaded not guilty, and because he could not afford to pay for a lawyer, he asked the trial court to appoint an attorney to defend him. The trial judge refused Betts's request because the courts in Maryland commonly appointed counsel only in special circumstances, such as cases involving mentally incompetent defendants or cases that involved the possibility of the death penalty. Smith Betts represented himself in court and was judged guilty. The judge sentenced him to eight years in the Maryland penitentiary.

While in jail, Betts filed habeas corpus petitions, which required the state either to justify holding him in jail or release him. He demanded to be released on the grounds that he was wrongfully convicted because his constitutional right to a lawyer had been denied. The courts refused his petitions. So Betts appealed his case to the U.S. Supreme Court.

The Issue

Smith Betts argued that he had been deprived of the right to a lawyer guaranteed by the 6th Amendment, which says: “In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right… to have the assistance of counsel for his defense.” Furthermore, the 14th Amendment says that no state government “shall deprive any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law.”

Did the U.S. Constitution require the state of Maryland to provide a lawyer for a defendant too poor to pay for legal help? Could the right to “assistance of counsel “specified in the 6th Amendment be applied to a state government through the due process clause of the 14th Amendment?

Opinion of the Court

The Court decided that “the Sixth Amendment of the Constitution applied only to trials in federal courts.” The Court concluded that the Maryland legal system had given Smith Betts ample means to defend himself during his trial. In cases that did not involve capital punishment, a state did not have to provide a lawyer for a defendant too poor to pay for one.

Dissent

Justice Hugo Black was joined in dissent by Justices William O. Douglas and Frank Murphy. Black argued that the due process clause of the 14th Amendment “incorporates” those rights spelled out in the federal Bill of Rights, which includes the 6th Amendment guarantee of the right “to have the assistance of counsel.” Justice Black therefore concluded that the state of Maryland had denied Smith Betts one of his constitutional rights.

Justice Black wrote that no person should “be deprived of counsel merely because of his poverty. To do so, seems to me to defeat the promise of our democratic society to provide equal justice under the law.”

Significance

The Court's decision in Betts v. Brady prevailed until the 1960s. Justice Black's ringing dissent was not forgotten, however. The Court eventually overruled the Betts v. Brady decision in Gideon v. Wainwright (1963). And Justice Black, a dissenter in the Betts case, wrote the opinion for the Court in the Gideon case. .

See also Gideon v. Wainwright; Incorporation doctrine; Rights of the accused

Sources

• Eden Force, The Sixth Amendment (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Silver Burdett, 1991)

Betts v. Brady
Supreme Court of the United States
Argued April 13–14, 1942 Decided June 1, 1942
Full case name	Betts v. Brady
Citations	316 U.S. 455 (more) 62 S. Ct. 1252; 86 L. Ed. 1595; 1942 U.S. LEXIS 489
Prior history	None
Subsequent history	Gideon v. Wainwright
Holding
Due process of law demands that where a man is tried for robbery, Maryland does not have to furnish counsel to an indigent defendant.
Court membership
Chief Justice Harlan F. Stone Associate Justices Owen J. Roberts · Hugo Black Stanley F. Reed · Felix Frankfurter William O. Douglas · Frank Murphy James F. Byrnes · Robert H. Jackson
Case opinions
Majority	Roberts, joined by Stone, Reed, Frankfurter, Byrnes, Jackson
Dissent	Black, joined by Douglas, Murphy
Laws applied
U.S. Const. amends. VI, XIV
Overruled by
Gideon v. Wainwright

Betts v. Brady, 316 U.S. 455 (1942), was a landmark United States Supreme Court case that denied counsel to indigent defendants when prosecuted by a state. It was overruled by Gideon v. Wainwright.

Contents 1 Facts 2 Procedure 3 Issue 4 See also 4.1 External links

Facts

In its decision in Johnson v. Zerbst, the Supreme Court had held that defendants in federal courts had a right to counsel guaranteed by the Sixth Amendment. In Powell v. Alabama, the Court had held that state defendants in capital cases were entitled to counsel, even when they could not afford it; however, the right to an attorney in trials in the states was not yet obligatory in all cases as it was in federal courts under Johnson v. Zerbst. In Betts v. Brady, Betts was indicted for robbery and upon his request for counsel, the trial judge refused, forcing Betts to represent himself. He was convicted of robbery, a conviction he eventually appealed to the Supreme Court on the basis that he was being held unlawfully because he had been denied counsel.

Procedure

He filed writ of habeas corpus at the Circuit Court for Washington County, Maryland claiming he had been denied counsel and then filed a writ to Court of Appeals of Maryland. His petitions were all denied and he finally filed for certiorari to the Supreme Court.

Issue

In a six to three decision, the Court found that Betts did not have the right to be appointed counsel with Justice Hugo Black emphatically dissenting. In the majority opinion, Justice Owen Roberts said for the Court,

"The Fourteenth Amendment prohibits the conviction and incarceration of one whose trial is offensive to the common and fundamental ideas of fairness and right, and while want of counsel in a particular case may result in a conviction lacking in such fundamental fairness, we cannot say that the amendment embodies an inexorable command that no trial for any offense, or in any court, can be fairly conducted and justice accorded a defendant who is not represented by counsel."

In this selection from the majority opinion and throughout the rest of the opinion, Roberts continually makes the point that not all defendants in all cases will need the assistance of counsel in order to receive a fair trial with due process. Roberts appears to be of the opinion that, while counsel may be necessary to receive a fair trial in some cases, it is not in all cases. However, in his dissent, Black wrote,

"A practice cannot be reconciled with ‘common and fundamental ideas of fairness and right,’ which subjects innocent men to increased dangers of conviction merely because of their poverty. Whether a man is innocent cannot be determined from a trial in which, as here, denial of counsel has made it impossible to conclude, with any satisfactory degree of certainty, that the defendant's case was adequately presented."

Black said basically in his dissent that the denial of counsel based on financial stability makes it so that those in poverty have an increased chance of conviction, which is not equal protection of the laws under the Fourteenth Amendment. During his dissent, Black cited also Johnson v. Zerbst, making the point that had the proceedings of Betts’s case been held in federal court, his petition for counsel to be appointed to him would have been accepted and counsel would have been appointed. Black argued that because this right was guaranteed in federal courts, the Fourteenth Amendment should make the right obligatory upon the states; however, the majority disagreed. Black argued also that a man of even average intelligence could not possibly be expected to represent himself without any training in such matters as the law.

See also

• List of United States Supreme Court cases, volume 316

External links

• Works related to Betts v. Brady at Wikisource

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