Equal Justice for All

The promise is made with all the authority of the Constitution: Rich or poor, U.S. citizens are entitled to equal justice. But promise and practice in U.S.

law can sometimes seem worlds apart.

It was not until 1956, Supreme Court Justice Arthur Goldberg reminded New York University law students last week, that the Supreme Court finally "made its first broad pronouncement in the area of economic equality in the criminal process."

^ Severe Disadvantages. The landmark Griffin v. Illinois decision held that constitutional rights were violated by a state law under which defendants had to purchase a transcript of the trial be fore they could appeal to a higher court.

"There can be no equal justice," said the court, "where the kind of trial a man gets depends on the amount of money he has." Since then, the court has handed down several related rulings, notably the Gideon decision affirming the right to court-appointed counsel in all criminal cases if a defendant cannot afford to hire a lawyer (TIME, Oct. 18).

Even so, said Goldberg, the defendant without money remains under severe disadvantages.

"After arrest, the accused who is poor must often await the disposition of his case in jail because of his inability to raise bail, while the accused who can afford bail is free to return to his family and his job. Equally important, he is free during the critical period between arrest and trial to help his attorney with the investigation and preparation of his defense." After the trial, said Justice Goldberg, the fine-or-imprisonment choice often specified by law for minor offenses "may also be unfair to the defendant without means. The 'choice' of paying $100 fine or spending 30 days in jail is really no choice at all to the person who cannot raise $100. The resulting imprisonment is no more or less than imprisonment for being poor."

What About the. Victim? Goldberg did more than criticize; he proposed some reforms. After "careful screening," he said, most defendants should be released without bail pending trial. And "we should certainly consider adopting procedures whereby persons erroneously charged with crime could be reimbursed for their expenditures in defending against the charge."

He was well aware, Goldberg added, that whenever anyone urges more help for the accused, "the question arises: But what about the victim? We should confront the problem of the victim directly; his burden is not alleviated by denying necessary services to the accused. Many countries throughout the world, recognizing that crime is a community problem, have designed systems for government compensation of victims of crime. Serious consideration of this approach is long overdue here. The victim of a robbery or an assault has been denied the protection of the laws in a very real sense, and society should assume some responsibility for making him whole."

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