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Lawyers 'Protect' Rights of Individual
Lawyers have made opposition possible to government encroachment on individual rights, William Ferguson, Kansas attorney general said last night.
"They are the ones who are spokesmen for those who the government is trying to suppress in one way or another," he stated.
Ferguson's remarks were made in a talk to the KU Chancery Club. a group of students interested in the law profession as a career.
Wednesday, Nov. 20, 1963 University Daily Kansan
THE FIRST CONCEPT of individual rights, Ferguson said, evolved in England during the reign of James I (1603-1625). Lord Coke, the attorney general of the nation objected to the king's claim of sovereign right to levy taxes and amend all laws without the consent of Parliament. Lord Coke, through Parliament, finally forced King James I to renounce his sovereign right and to establish "habeus corpus," which declared that no man can be held without the government showing just cause for doing so.
Ferguson cited recent U.S. Supreme Court rulings which, he said, demonstrate the effectiveness of lawyers in preserving the rights of individuals.
This effectiveness is best demonstrated in the landmark cases of the Supreme Court. Landmark cases are those decisions which set a new course in American law. Those decisions have redesigned the concept of civil rights, Ferguson explained.
THE FIRST SUCH landmark decision. Ferguson said, was the Supreme Court ruling in 1954 on the case of "Brown vs. the City of Topeka." In the ruling the court declared the "separate but equal doctrine" in primary and secondary education violates the "due process and protection clause of Article XIV of the United State Constitution. The clause states: "No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States, nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law, nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."
Ferguson also cited the court's ruling in "Mapp vs. Ohio" in 1961 on search and seizure procedures. The Supreme Court held that all courts should follow the "exclusionary rule" which states that all evidence improperly or illegally obtained may not be admitted into court as evidence.
Ferguson said this ruling forced Kansas police officers to change their procedures because since territorial days, search warrants had
not been used by policemen in obtaining evidence.
"AS A RESULT we have had to restrain Kansas police officers in obtaining evidence. This burdens peace officers, but it protects individual rights guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution." he said.
The 1962 court ruling in the case "Baker vs. Carr" was also examined by Ferguson. In that decision the court held that the matter of legislative apportionment is a justiciable issue meaning that it was liable to a trial in a court of justice.
OF THE reapportionment measure Ferguson said, "I thought it was well done. That is, until I found out that they had left Leawood out. Leawood was omitted by a clerical error when the measure was under consideration by the legislature.
If the Kansas Supreme Court can not add Leawood, a special legislative session will have to be held to correct the mistake, Ferguson said.
In April of this year the court handed down decisions in three landmark rulings concerned with right to counsel, he said.
The U.S. Supreme Court has also showed great interest in the individual's right to counsel in jury trials, Ferguson continued.
FERGUSON explained that in the first of these cases, "Draper vs. Washington," the court declared indigents have the same rights before a court as do people with money. In the case "Gideon vs. Wainwright," the court held that counsel must be provided by the state in all appeal cases in which the defendant is an indigent.
In the third case, "Douglas vs. California," the court ruled that a transcript of the trial was to be made available to indigents in appeal cases, and that this was to be done at the state's expense.
The point of the court's rulings, Ferguson said, is that justice in the courts of America must not be based on ability to pay.
Providing counsel for indigents has helped create a tangle of appeals in the courts since many court-appointed counsels are young lawyers beginning practice, Ferguson said. In some cases, defendants who are convicted have appealed the conviction because they claim the court-appointed lawyer was incompetent, and thus they were denied due process of law.
"All these cases were possible because some lawyer had taken the case all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court and established the individual's rights," Ferguson concluded.
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