The Gender of Gideon

This short program on the gender of Gideon v. Wainright will feature a discussion of recent research by Kathryn A. Sabbeth and Jessica K. Steinberg, indicating that the constitutional guarantee of counsel adopted by the Supreme Court in Gideon v. Wainright accrues largely to the benefit of men, primarily because the decision ignores that millions of women face compulsory and highly punitive encounters with the justice system in the civil courts. Qudsiya Naqui, an Officer with the Civil Legal System Modernization Project at Pew Charitable Trusts and host of Down to the Struts (a blog about disability and design) will join Professor Sabbeth to discuss the potential implications of Sabbeth’s and Steinberg’s research for expanding access to civil justice.