Their home page prominently displays a quote from Thomas Jefferson: “When injustice becomes law, resistance becomes duty.” Their invitation: Join the resistance.
During the past six months, more than 6,000 state and federal public defenders from around the country have accepted the invitation to join a new organization formed to “own” the problems and future of indigent defense, as one of its founders put it. The catalyst was the 50th anniversary of the landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision, Gideon v. Wainwright, in which the justices held that the Sixth Amendment required states to provide counsel to poor defendants charged with serious crimes.
