Powell v. Alabama

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Powell v. Alabama
Reference: 287 U.S. 45
Term: 1932
Important Dates
Argued: October 10, 1932 Decided: November 7, 1932
Outcome
Supreme Court of Alabama reversed and remanded
Majority
Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes • Louis Brandeis • Benjamin Cardozo • Owen Roberts • Harlan Fiske Stone • George Sutherland • Willis Van DeVanter
Dissenting
Pierce Butler • James C. McReynolds

Powell v. Alabama is a case decided on November 7, 1932, by the United States Supreme Court holding that, under the Sixth Amendment, counsel must be provided to all defendants charged with a capital felony in a state court regardless of that defendant's ability to pay. The case concerned whether the Sixth Amendment right to counsel was binding on state governments as a requirement of the Fourteenth Amendment's Due Process Clause. The Supreme Court reversed the decision of the Alabama Supreme Court.

HIGHLIGHTS

The case: A group of nine African American men were accused of raping two white women in Alabama and all nine of them were sentenced to death after one day of legal proceedings. The state was required to provide counsel for defendants in capital cases, however, the attorneys that represented the defendants did not consult them on the case.

The issue: Does the denial of counsel for proceedings in state court constitute a violation of the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution?

The outcome: The Supreme Court reversed the decision of the Alabama Supreme Court and held that states must provide counsel to all defendants charged with a capital felony.

Why it matters: The Supreme Court's decision in this case established that the Sixth Amendment right to counsel was made binding on state governments as a requirement of the Fourteenth Amendment's Due Process Clause. The practice of making provisions of the Bill of Rights binding on state governments via a Supreme Court decision is known as incorporation. To read more about the impact of Powell v. Alabama click here.

Background

On March 25, 1931, nine African American males, seven white males, and two white females were riding in a "gondola car"—an open-air car—on a freight train traveling through Alabama. During the course of the trip, a fight broke out between the males. All seven white males were thrown from the car. A message was sent ahead reporting the fight and requesting that all African Americans on the train be removed. The train was stopped at Paint Rock, Alabama, and a group of sheriffs seized the nine African American males allegedly involved in the fight, two other African Americans who were not involved in the fight, and the two white females in the gondola car. The males involved in the fight and the two females were transferred to the county seat, Scottsboro, Alabama.

The two females alleged that they had been sexually assaulted by the African American males, and news of this accusation spread as the males were detained and, later, transferred to Scottsboro. According to the court's opinion, "Word of their coming and of the alleged assault had preceded them, and they were met at Scottsboro by a large crowd. It does not sufficiently appear that the defendants were seriously threatened with, or that they were actually in danger of, mob violence; but it does appear that the attitude of the community was one of great hostility. The sheriff thought it necessary to call for the militia to assist in safeguarding the prisoners."

While detained, the males were transferred to Gadsden out of concern for their safety, but were returned to the county courthouse in Scottsboro to be arraigned on March 31, 1931. The defendants pleaded not guilty. They were indicted for rape that same day. There was a question as to whether the defendants were represented by counsel at their arraignment. Alabama state law required the appointment of counsel for a capital felony, but the U.S. Supreme Court's opinion in the case cited a colloquy from the trial court judge regarding the issue of the counsel at arraignment:

"

There is a further recital to the effect that upon the arraignment they were represented by counsel. But no counsel had been employed, and aside from a statement made by the trial judge several days later during a colloquy immediately preceding the trial, the record does not disclose when, or under what circumstances, an appointment of counsel was made, or who was appointed. During the colloquy referred to, the trial judge, in response to a question, said that he had appointed all the members of the bar for the purpose of arraigning the defendants and then of course anticipated that the members of the bar would continue to help the defendants if no counsel appeared.

”

The judge set a trial date for April 6, 1931, six days after the indictment was handed down. On the morning of April 6, a Tennessee attorney, Stephen R. Roddy, appeared in court to represent the defendants, as no member of the county bar had taken responsibility for the defense. Roddy had been sent from Chattanooga, Tennessee, the city from which the freight train had departed. The judge authorized a local attorney, Milo Moody, to aid Roddy in his cases.

The state requested a severance of the cases, and the defendants were tried in three different groups in three separate trials. Each of the trials was completed in a single day. Under Alabama law, the punishment for a rape conviction ranged from 10 years in prison to a sentence of death, and these punishments were to be fixed by the jury. Each of the defendants except the youngest—13-year-old Roy Wright—were sentenced to death. The trial court overruled motions for new trials and upheld the jury's sentences. The Supreme Court of Alabama affirmed the convictions and sentences.

Oral argument

Oral argument was held on October 10, 1932. The case was decided on November 7, 1932.

Decision

The Supreme Court decided 7-2 to reverse and remand the decision of the Alabama Supreme Court. Justice George Sutherland delivered the opinion of the court. Justice Pierce Butler wrote a dissenting opinion.

Opinion

Opinion of the court

Writing for a seven-justice majority, Justice George Sutherland limited the court's inquiry in this decision to a single issue: whether or not the defendants had been denied counsel:

"	In this court the judgments are assailed upon the grounds that the defendants, and each of them, were denied due process of law and the equal protection of the laws, in contravention of the Fourteenth Amendment, specifically as follows: (1) They were not given a fair, impartial, and deliberate trial; (2) they were denied the right of counsel, with the accustomed incidents of consultation and opportunity of preparation for trial; and (3) they were tried before juries from which qualified members of their own race were systematically excluded. These questions were properly raised and saved in the courts below. The only one of the assignments which we shall consider is the second, in respect of the denial of counsel; and it becomes unnecessary to discuss the facts of the case or the circumstances surrounding the prosecution except in so far as they reflect light upon that question.	”
—George Sutherland, majority opinion in Powell v. Alabama

Were the defendants denied counsel?

After a review of the factual and procedural record, Justice Sutherland addressed whether or not the defendants had, in fact, been denied counsel:

"	The record shows that immediately upon the return of the indictment defendants were arraigned and pleaded not guilty. Apparently they were not asked whether they had, or were able to employ, counsel, or wished to have counsel appointed; or whether they had friends or relatives who might assist in that regard if communicated with. That it would not have been an idle ceremony to have given the defendants reasonable opportunity to communicate with their families and endeavor to obtain counsel is demonstrated by the fact that very soon after conviction, able counsel appeared in their behalf ... It is hardly necessary to say that the right to counsel being conceded, a defendant should be afforded a fair opportunity to secure counsel of his own choice. Not only was that not done here, but such designation of counsel as was attempted was either so indefinite or so close upon the trial as to amount to a denial of effective and substantial aid in that regard.	”
—George Sutherland, majority opinion in Powell v. Alabama

To substantiate this point, Justice Sutherland included in the court's opinion a copy of the record from the trial court in which the presiding judge and Mr. Roddy discussed the status of the defendants' counsel. The trial judge, though appointing all members of the bar to represent the defendants, did not require any one lawyer to appear. Justice Sutherland found this representation by designation only to "have fallen far short of meeting, in any proper sense, a requirement for the appointment of counsel." He also wrote that the trial judge's appointment "was little more than an expansive gesture, imposing no substantial or definite obligation upon any one ... In any event, the circumstance lends emphasis to the conclusion that during perhaps the most critical period of the proceedings against these defendants, that is to say, from the time of their arraignment until the beginning of their trial, when consultation, thorough-going investigation and preparation were vitally important, the defendants did not have the aid of counsel in any real sense, although they were as much entitled to such aid during that period as at the trial itself ... Under the circumstances disclosed, we hold that the defendants were not accorded the right of counsel in any substantial sense. To decide otherwise, would simply be to ignore actualities."

Does the Fourteenth Amendment's due process clause incorporate the Sixth Amendment's right to counsel?

In reviewing English common law tradition, as well as American colonial and state constitutional practices regarding the right of counsel, Justice Sutherland sought to examine whether the right to counsel fell under the category of provisions of due process required of state governments under the Fourteenth Amendment. In the court's view, the answer was yes:

"	The fact that the right involved is of such a character that it cannot be denied without violating those 'fundamental principles of liberty and justice which lie at the base of all our civil and political institutions' ... is obviously one of those compelling considerations which must prevail in determining whether it is embraced within the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, although it be specifically dealt with in another part of the Federal Constitution. Evidently this court, in the later cases enumerated, regarded the rights there under consideration as of this fundamental character. That some such distinction must be observed is foreshadowed in Twining v. New Jersey, ... where Mr. Justice Moody, speaking for the court, said that: ' ... It is possible that some of the personal rights safeguarded by the first eight Amendments against national action may also be safeguarded against state action, because a denial of them would be a denial of due process of law ... If this is so, it is not because those rights are enumerated in the first eight Amendments, but because they are of such a nature that they are included in the conception of due process of law.' While the question has never been categorically determined by this court, a consideration of the nature of the right and a review of the expressions of this and other courts makes it clear that the right to the aid of counsel is of this fundamental character.	”
—George Sutherland, majority opinion in Powell v. Alabama

Decision

Justice Sutherland, upon clarifying the procedural application of right to counsel, concluded his opinion by reaffirming the right to counsel's fundamental status in capital felony cases:

"	[W]e think the failure of the trial court to give them reasonable time and opportunity to secure counsel was a clear denial of due process. But passing that, and assuming their inability, even if opportunity had been given, to employ counsel, as the trial court evidently did assume, we are of opinion that, under the circumstances just stated, the necessity of counsel was so vital and imperative that the failure of the trial court to make an effective appointment of counsel was likewise a denial of due process within the meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment. Whether this would be so in other criminal prosecutions, or under other circumstances, we need not determine. All that it is necessary now to decide, as we do decide, is that in a capital case, where the defendant is unable to employ counsel, and is incapable adequately of making his own defense because of ignorance, feeble-mindedness, illiteracy, or the like, it is the duty of the court, whether requested or not, to assign counsel for him as a necessary requisite of due process of law; and that duty is not discharged by an assignment at such a time or under such circumstances as to preclude the giving of effective aid in the preparation and trial of the case ... In a case such as this, whatever may be the rule in other cases, the right to have counsel appointed, when necessary, is a logical corollary from the constitutional right to be heard by counsel.	”
—George Sutherland, majority opinion in Powell v. Alabama

The court subsequently reversed the judgments of the Alabama Supreme Court and remanded the cases.

Dissenting opinion

Joined in dissent by Justice James C. McReynolds, Justice Pierce Butler disagreed with the court's view that the defendants were denied due process. Justice Butler's review of the case record led him to conclude that the case record "wholly fails to reveal that petitioners have been deprived of any right guaranteed by the Federal Constitution, and I am of opinion that the judgment should be affirmed."

Impact

Though limited solely to capital felony cases, the court's opinion in Powell was the first time the Sixth Amendment's right to counsel was incorporated to state governments via the Fourteenth Amendment due process clause. It wasn't until the court's 1963 opinion in Gideon v. Wainwright that the right to counsel would be extended to all criminal felonies. Eventually, the right was extended to include all crimes for which incarceration could be imposed in Argersinger v. Hamlin.

See also

• The Hughes Court
• Supreme Court of the United States
• History of the Supreme Court
• Federalism

External links

• Full text of case syllabus and opinions (Justia)
• Supreme Court of the United States