''Johnson v. Zerbst'', 304 U.S. 458 (1938), was a

United States Supreme Court The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all U.S. federal court cases, and over state court cases that turn on question ...

case, in which the petitioner, Johnson, had been convicted in federal court of feloniously possessing, uttering, and passing

counterfeit money Counterfeit money is currency produced outside of the legal sanction of a state or government, usually in a deliberate attempt to imitate that currency and so as to deceive its recipient. Producing or using counterfeit money is a form of fraud ...

in a trial where he had not been represented by an attorney but instead by himself. Johnson filed for

habeas corpus ''Habeas corpus'' (; from Medieval Latin, ) is a legal procedure invoking the jurisdiction of a court to review the unlawful detention or imprisonment of an individual, and request the individual's custodian (usually a prison official) to ...

relief, claiming that his Sixth Amendment

right to counsel In criminal law, the right to counsel means a defendant has a legal right to have the assistance of counsel (i.e., lawyers) and, if the defendant cannot afford a lawyer, requires that the government appoint one or pay the defendant's legal ex ...

had been violated, but he was denied by both a

federal district court The United States district courts are the trial courts of the U.S. federal judiciary. There is one district court for each federal judicial district. Each district covers one U.S. state or a portion of a state. There is at least one feder ...

and the

court of appeals An appellate court, commonly called a court of appeal(s), appeal court, court of second instance or second instance court, is any court of law that is empowered to hear a case upon appeal from a trial court or other lower tribunal. Appellat ...

Supreme Court involvement

The

agreed to hear the case and overturned the decisions of the lower courts. In a six to two decision, the Court held that the federal court had infringed upon Johnson's life and liberty by not giving him counsel to defend him during trial. In the majority opinion written by Justice

Hugo Black Hugo Lafayette Black (February 27, 1886 – September 25, 1971) was an American lawyer, politician, and jurist who served as a U.S. Senator from Alabama from 1927 to 1937 and as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, ass ...

, the Court held that,

Since the Sixth Amendment constitutionally entitles one charged with crime to the assistance of counsel, compliance with this constitutional mandate is an essential jurisdictional prerequisite to a federal court's authority to deprive an accused of his life or liberty. When this right is properly waived, the assistance of counsel is no longer a necessary element of the court's jurisdiction to proceed to conviction and sentence. If the accused, however, is not represented by counsel and has not competently and intelligently waived his constitutional right, the Sixth Amendment stands as a jurisdictional bar to a valid conviction and sentence depriving him of his life or his liberty.

This set the precedent that defendants have the right to be represented by an attorney unless they waive their right to counsel knowing full well the potential consequences. This precedent, however, only made this right applicable to federal defendants and did not extend to defendants in trials under state jurisdiction. Assistance of counsel was held to be requisite to due process of law in state felony proceedings with the ''

Gideon v. Wainwright ''Gideon v. Wainwright'', 372 U.S. 335 (1963), was a List of landmark court decisions in the United States, landmark Supreme Court of the United States, U.S. Supreme Court decision in which the Court ruled that the Sixth Amendment to the United S ...

'' decision in 1963..

References

External links

* * {{Sixth Amendment, counsel, state=expanded United States Sixth Amendment appointment of counsel case law United States Supreme Court cases United States Supreme Court cases of the Hughes Court 1938 in United States case law

Supreme Court involvement

See also

References

External links