The major reference point for public defense is Gideon v. Wainwright, the Supreme Court case in 1963 that created a constitutional right to defense. Gideon is etched into the culture of public defenders. It is the profession’s foundational myth.
Perhaps you’ve heard the story. Clarence Gideon, a vagrant, begged Florida trial court judge Robert McCrary Jr for the assistance of a lawyer. Judge McCrary told Gideon that he did not have the right to a lawyer. A jury convicted Gideon of breaking and entering with intent to commit petty larceny. Judge McCrary sentenced him to five years in prison — the maximum sentence — all while Gideon stood in the courtroom, alone, with no lawyer to defend him. From his jail cell, Gideon wrote a letter and filed an appeal with the Supreme Court, all by himself.
Abe Fortas, a powerhouse, Yale-educated lawyer, took on the case, bringing it all the way to the Supreme Court. Attorney Fortas, appearing before the Warren Court, persuaded the nine intellectual men to hear him. As a result of his persuasive rhetoric, the Court, in a unanimous decision, agreed, ordering a new trial for Clarence Gideon and that he be appointed a lawyer.
Liberal law schools everywhere champion this story as a testament to the will and fortitude of a man who kept pushing for his rights, and a Supreme Court who, in their wisdom, accepted the idea that everyone has a right to counsel even if they cannot afford a lawyer, and thus made it so across the nation in a unanimous opinion. The moral of the story is that an individual with faith in the system and a talented lawyer with the right ideas can change everything.
The problem with this myth is just that — it is a myth. It is a story drenched in the typical tropes of American mythmaking, particularly heroic individualism. It strips away the collective organizing of many over decades to emphasize the two actors — one man fighting for his rights, and the Supreme Court, an institution that listened to his argument, was persuaded, and did the right thing. This myth was created by, repeated by, and embraced by legal elites, because the story centers elites and elite institutions as the heroes of social change.
But down here in reality, what shapes the world is not the power of elite ideas, but class struggle.