Gideon’s Trumpet

In January 1962, the Supreme Court of the United States of America receives a letter from Clarence Earl Gideon, a prisoner in Florida. Not addressed to any particular person, it is added to the court’s Miscellaneous Docket. This Docket is largely comprised of cases brought by those who cannot afford the usual docketing fees. Such cases—known as in forma pauperis, or “in the manner of a pauper”—are shown special concern by the court’s rules. Gideon’s letter is written in pencil “like a schoolboy’s” (7) and is filled with surprising spellings and practiced—if archaic—legal terminology. Gideon’s letter complies with the court’s rules and asks that he be freed on grounds of habeas corpus that he has been illegally imprisoned.

Clarence Gideon is a 51-year-old white male who has been incarcerated numerous times. Not a professional criminal, he has struggled to settle down and find constituent work. Even those who have arrested Gideon consider him to be a “perfectly harmless human being, rather likeable, but tossed aside by life” (8). He has not given up, however, and feels passionately that the Florida courts have mistreated him. Gideon’s papers are approved by a clerk and given the number 890 Miscellaneous, standing out little among the many similar claims filed each year.