The Right to a Speedy and Public Trial: A Reference Guide to the United States Constitution

by Susan N. Herman

Herman provides an analysis and reference guide for the rights that the Sixth Amendment guarantees in all criminal prosecutions. She provides a history of the generation of each right from ancient times through the present. The public trial chapters analyze the development of Supreme Court case law interpreting the Sixth Amendment right and the companion First Amendment right of public access to trials, and then discuss current issues in interpretation of the Sixth Amendment right, including the controversial issue of cameras in the courtroom and the current questions about open proceedings involving alleged terrorists. The speedy trial chapters trace the development of the ideal of prompt proceedings and the Supreme Court's laws in this area, including a critique of the major Supreme Court cases.

280 pages, Hardcover

First published July 1, 2006

About the author

Susan N. Herman is the president of the American Civil Liberties Union. She previously worked as the ACLU's general counsel and served on its board. Herman has taught at Brooklyn Law School since 1980.

Her most recent work of constitutional scholarship, Taking Liberties: The War on Terror and the Erosion of American Democracy, was published by Oxford University Press in October 2011.