Yevgeny Shrago
A few months ago, the New York State judiciary recognized that the rising costs and complexity of litigation made denying counsel to civil defendants increasingly tantamount to entering a default judgment against them. Recently, the US Supreme Court began to inch its way back from the post-Lassiter ledge, picking out a civil situation where right to counsel (or some other substantial due process rights) is required by due process. Those frustrated by the the massively important rulings (and painful defeats for progressives) in Dukes and American Electric Power should take some solace in the small victory for rights represented by the positive ruling in Turner v. Rogers.