The Sixth Amendment

The Sixth Amendment, ratified in 1791, is the procedural heart of the American criminal trial. It guarantees the accused a speedy and public trial by an impartial jury of the state and district where the crime was committed. It requires that the defendant be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation, be confronted with the witnesses against him, have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and have the assistance of counsel for his defense. Each clause has generated its own line of cases.

The right to a jury trial reflects a deep skepticism of unchecked judicial power. Twelve ordinary citizens, drawn from the community, stand between the accused and the state. The Supreme Court has applied the right against the states through the Fourteenth Amendment in Duncan v. Louisiana in 1968 and has held in Apprendi v. New Jersey in 2000 and Blakely v. Washington in 2004 that any fact that increases the maximum penalty must be found by the jury, not the judge.

The Assistance of Counsel Clause has been transformed by judicial interpretation. The original understanding was that the accused had the right to retain a lawyer if he could afford one. The Supreme Court extended that right in Powell v. Alabama in 1932 to require appointed counsel in capital cases and in Gideon v. Wainwright in 1963 to require appointed counsel in all felony cases, regardless of ability to pay. Argersinger v. Hamlin in 1972 extended Gideon to any case that could result in imprisonment. The Confrontation Clause was reinvigorated in Crawford v. Washington in 2004, which held that testimonial out-of-court statements cannot be introduced against a defendant unless the witness is unavailable and the defendant had a prior opportunity to cross-examine. Together, the clauses of the Sixth Amendment structure the American adversarial trial.