What is the Sixth Amendment?

The Sixth Amendment guarantees the procedural rights of people accused of crimes in federal and state courts. Ratified on December 15, 1791 as part of the Bill of Rights, its eighty-one words list seven specific protections: the right to a speedy trial, a public trial, an impartial jury, notice of the accusation, confrontation of opposing witnesses, compulsory process to obtain favorable witnesses, and assistance of counsel for the defense. These protections grew out of colonial grievances about secret trials, distant venues, and lack of legal representation, abuses listed in the 1776 Declaration of Independence and addressed by colonial constitutions before James Madison drafted the federal version.

Each clause has produced significant case law. The speedy trial right, codified by the federal Speedy Trial Act of 1974, generally requires trial within seventy days of indictment, with extensions for justified delays. Barker v. Wingo (1972) set a four factor balancing test for determining whether a delay violates the Constitution. The public trial requirement was applied to states in In re Oliver (1948) and prevents secret proceedings, although Press-Enterprise Co. v. Superior Court (1984) allows narrow closures to protect compelling interests.

The impartial jury clause requires jury pools drawn from a fair cross-section of the community, recognized in Taylor v. Louisiana (1975), and prohibits race-based or sex-based peremptory challenges under Batson v. Kentucky (1986) and J.E.B. v. Alabama (1994). The notice clause requires indictments and informations to specify the alleged offense with enough detail to allow preparation of a defense. The confrontation clause, recently strengthened by Crawford v. Washington (2004), generally requires that testimonial statements be made in court and subject to cross-examination. The compulsory process clause, applied to states in Washington v. Texas (1967), allows defendants to subpoena witnesses and present a defense.

The right to counsel, the most consequential clause in modern practice, was extended to all felony defendants in state courts by Gideon v. Wainwright (1963), to misdemeanor cases involving incarceration in Argersinger v. Hamlin (1972), and to critical pretrial stages in United States v. Wade (1967) and Massiah v. United States (1964). The Court added a right to effective counsel in Strickland v. Washington (1984). Almost all of the Sixth Amendment has been incorporated against the states through the Fourteenth Amendment Due Process Clause. Naturalization candidates should know the amendment as the constitutional foundation for fair criminal procedure.