More on Gideon: An “Unfunded Mandate”?

Fifty years later, the American legal profession has failed to answer “Gideon’s trumpet,” or so says Stephen Bright, visiting Yale Law professor and president of Southern Center for Human Rights.  According to Bright, Gideon v. Wainwright represents essentially an unfunded mandate.

Following Attorney General Eric Holder’s statements that the nation’s public defense is “in a state of crisis,”  NPR’s Talk of the Nation explored the state of the public defense system with Bright as well as Douglas Wilson, Colorado State public defender.

This discussion runs 30:16 minutes.

Yesterday was the fiftieth anniversary of the seminal decision as was discussed in yesterday’s blog post: Gideon Turns 50.