Access to Justice [Hardcover]

Equal Justice Under Law is one of America's most proudly proclaimed and widely violated legal principles. But it comes nowhere close to describing the legal system in practice. Millions of Americans lack any access to justice, let alone equal access. Worse, the increasing centrality of law in American life and its growing complexity has made access to legal assistance critical for all citizens. Yet according to most estimates about four-fifths of the legal needs of the poor, and two- to three-fifths of the needs of middle-income individuals remain unmet. This book reveals the inequities of legal assistance in America, from the lack of access to educational services and health benefits to gross injustices in the criminal defense system. It proposes a specific agenda for change, offering tangible reforms for coordinating comprehensive systems for the delivery of legal services, maximizing individual's opportunities to represent themselves, and making effective legal services more affordable for all Americans who need them.


1. Equal Justice Under Law: The Gap between Principle and Practice
2. Litigation and Its Discontents: Too Much Law for Those Who Can Afford It, Too Little for Everyone Else
3. Historical Perspectives: Legal Rights and Social Wrongs
4. Access to What? Law without Lawyers and New Models of Legal Assistance
5. Locked In and Locked Out: The Legal Needs of Low-Income Communities
6. Presumed Guilty: Class Injustice in Criminal Justice
7. Pro Bono in Principle and in Practice
8. A Roadmap for Reform
Notes.
Index.

Rhode has written an important, thoughtful, and well-argued book. --Law and Politics Book Review

What makes Ms. Rhode such an effective advocate is not the piercing nature of her salvos--which are lethal--but the abundance of support for her arguments.Access to Justiceis thoroughly researched and finely written. --New York Law Journal

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