§ 24.01 Miranda: A Brief Overview and Some Reflections

• Jurisdiction: United States

§ 24.01 Miranda: A Brief Overview and Some Reflections¹

Miranda v. Arizona² is one of the most famous Supreme Court decisions in American history. Thanks to the media and police shows on television, nearly every American and many citizens of other countries have heard of Miranda. According to one study of lawyers, it is the most memorable criminal case in Supreme Court jurisprudence, and the third most notable overall.³

Fame and acceptance, however, are two different concepts. The Miranda opinion itself mustered only five votes, and proved to be immediately controversial in many circles. According to one observer, the opinion "must rank as the most bitterly criticized, most contentious, and most diversely analyzed criminal procedure decision by the Warren Court."⁴ The decision originally "evoked much anger and spread much sorrow"⁵ among police officers and legislators, many of whom believed that the decision would impede law enforcement efforts to obtain confessions of guilt. As a result of these early criticisms of Miranda, Congress in 1968 — just two years after the decision was handed down — sought to "overrule" the holding by legislation.⁶ In later years, however, matters have been turned on their head: Most large-city police administrators do not want Miranda overruled,⁷ while some pro-defense scholars have come to criticize Miranda for not going far enough to protect suspects from improper police interrogation procedures.⁸

Miranda's influence has stretched well beyond the police interrogation room. The decision, the values underlying it, and the public's perception of it were factors in the refusal of the United States Senate to confirm Abe Fortas, a member of the Miranda majority, as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, and Miranda may have helped elect Richard Nixon to the presidency.⁹

Miranda — the legal doctrine — is alive,¹⁰ but in deeply weakened condition. One former member of the Court, years ago, described the case as "twisting slowly in the wind."¹¹ As demonstrated in this chapter, the Miranda of 1966 is not the Miranda of the twenty-first century. Professor Yale Kamisar has observed that, with the departure of Earl Warren and other members of his Court, "almost all Court watchers expected the ^reme Court to treat Miranda unkindly. They did not have to wait very long."¹² In most regards, Miranda has been narrowly interpreted, waiver of "Miranda rights" have been made easier for the prosecution to prove, and exceptions to the doctrine have...