Not so meaningful anymore: why a law library is required to make a prisoner's access to the courts meaningful.

• Author: Schoulen, Joseph A.

INTRODUCTION

All citizens of the United States enjoy a right to meaningful access to the judicial system. Courts must be especially vigilant in protecting this right to access for groups who, because of prejudice, societal indifference, or a lack of resources, have trouble gaining meaningful access to the courts for themselves. (1) In an effort to protect this right, the Supreme Court has struck down laws and policies that have denied citizens access to the courts based on such factors as race, sex, and wealth. The Supreme Court has also recognized and protected the right of prisoners to have meaningful access to the judicial system. (2) For prisoners, the Court has characterized meaningful access as including the provision of an adequate law library or the assistance of trained legal personnel. (3)

While the right to meaningful access ensures that no citizen is unjustly denied the right to get into court, standing is the constitutional gatekeeping mechanism courts use to keep potential litigants out of court. (4) Courts have continually recognized the three constitutional requirements plaintiffs must satisfy to demonstrate standing: (1) "injury in fact" or actual injury must exist; (2) the injury must be "fairly traceable" to the alleged violation; and (3) the court must be capable of redressing the injury. (5)

The Supreme Court's decision in Lewis v. Casey (6) shows a convergence of the two opposing forces mentioned above: prisoners asserting their right to meaningful access to the judicial system, and the Court using the gatekeeping mechanism of standing to keep those prisoners, and future prisoners, from arguing the merits of their case in court. Lewis involved a class of prisoners in Arizona claiming that inadequacies in the state prison libraries caused a deprivation of their rights to meaningful access to the courts. (7) The district court, in granting the prisoners' requested relief, recognized inadequacies involving "the training of library staff, ... the updating of legal materials, ... [and] the availability of photocopying services." (8)

Resting its decision on the actual injury requirement of standing, the Supreme Court held that to show actual injury an "inmate ... must go one step further [beyond claiming an inadequate library or inadequate legal assistance] and demonstrate that the alleged shortcomings in the library or legal assistance program hindered his efforts to pursue a legal claim." (9) Writing for the majority, Justice Scalia suggested that a prisoner would have to allege something equivalent to having prepared a complaint that "was dismissed for failure to satisfy some technical requirement which, because of deficiencies in the prison's legal assistance facilities, he could not have known." (10)

Although a number of publications have looked to Lewis when criticizing the Court's standing jurisprudence, (11) there is a dearth of material providing a detailed examination of the Court's interpretation of the right to meaningful access. Examining the right to meaningful access, and how a law library is essential to a prisoner's exercise of that right, provides strong evidence supporting those who have criticized the Court's standing analysis in Lewis.

This Note argues that the Supreme Court's decision in Lewis is flawed in its characterization of the right to meaningful access and actual injury for the purpose of standing, as well as suggests the standards that are necessary to protect the constitutional rights of prisoners. Part I of this Note begins by examining the right to meaningful access to the courts. The initial focus will be on the right's development and general meaning. This Note concentrates on Supreme Court precedent invalidating laws or policies that amount to the State placing a direct or indirect bar on the access of certain indigent groups. Especially important will be the Court's assertions that, when the government provides a certain type of access to the courts, a policy that, in effect, makes this access unattainable for the indigent, there is a violation of the Equal Protection and Due Process Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment.

After looking at the right generally, this Note focuses on the right as it relates to prisoners specifically, with emphasis on the right to a law library or its equivalent. This Note argues that the Court's meaningful access precedent in the area of prisoners' rights is consistent with its decisions concerning the right generally. This consistency derives from holdings finding impermissible those policies barring indigent prisoners from access that is attainable by wealthier prisoners. Part I concludes by looking at how the Court's decision in Lewis limited this right to access.

Part II analyzes the application of the standing doctrine, focusing on the actual injury requirement. This Part analyzes which injuries are personal and sufficient to confer standing, and discusses the requirement of imminent future harm.

Part III argues that the Lewis decision was wrongly decided both in its characterization of the right to meaningful access to the judicial system, and in its finding that the plaintiffs did not meet the actual injury requirement of standing. Focusing on this necessity of a law library in allowing a prisoner to discover legal claims, the Note argues that without an adequate law library or adequate alternative an indigent prisoner is essentially barred from accessing the courts. In essence, failing to provide an adequate law library violates the Equal Protection and Due Process Clauses by placing a bar on the access of certain prisoners because of their indigency.

Admittedly, prisoners must have an interest in reaching the courts that justifies constitutional protection against a complete bar from access. For that reason, Part III also examines the interests at play in prisoner litigation, and attempts to demonstrate that those interests are of comparable importance to those that the Court has recognized in its meaningful access jurisprudence. The focus will be on habeas claims and [section] 1983 claims regarding prison conditions.

In discussing the Court's standing decision, the Note argues that the Lewis Court's elevated standard is inappropriate under both characterizations of the right to meaningful access--the standard for which this Note argues (one which includes a law library or adequate alternative), as well as the characterization of meaningful access the Court used in Lewis. Following discussion of how the Court erred in its decision, Part IV of this Note discusses the consequences of these errors and suggests a proper remedy in cases where the government has denied prisoners their right to meaningful access.

1. RIGHT TO MEANINGFUL ACCESS TO THE COURTS

   1. Background

      To understand how the Court misconstrued the right to meaningful access in Lewis, one must understand the purpose and scope of the right in general. Boddie v. Connecticut (12) and Griffin v. Illinois (13) provide helpful illustrations of the Supreme Court's right to access precedent.

      In Boddie, an indigent couple challenged a filing fee of approximately sixty dollars that the State required to obtain a divorce. (14) In invalidating the law as it applied to indigent couples who could not obtain a divorce for the sole reason that they could not pay the filing fee, the Court held "that the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment requires that these appellants be afforded an opportunity to go into court to obtain a divorce." (15) The Court considered the fact that Connecticut had "blocked access to the judicial process" to be a violation of the Constitution. (16)

      Much of the Court's logic in Boddie rested on its decision in Griffin v. Illinois. Justice Black framed the issue in Griffin as "whether Illinois may, consistent with the Due Process and Equal Protection Clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment, administer this statute so as to deny adequate appellate review to the poor while granting such review to all others." (17) In striking down the state statute, Justice Black noted that although the right to an appeal is not a constitutional guarantee, a state cannot provide access to some citizens, but then, through the imposition of fees, place a bar on the same access, effectively preventing the indigent from enjoying it. (18)

   2. Prison Context

      1. A Prisoner's Right to Access Pre-Bounds

         Long before Lewis, courts recognized that prisoners had a right to meaningful access to the judicial system. The Supreme Court in particular had consistently recognized the right to access for prisoners. (19) Ex parte Hull is one of the first examples in which the Supreme Court affirmed a prisoner's right to access. (20) In Hull, the Court invalidated a prison regulation that impeded a prisoner's ability to file for a writ of habeas corpus. (21) This holding ensures a right for prisoners to access the federal courts for the purpose of filing habeas corpus petitions. (22) Although Hull established that prisoners had a right to access the judicial system, the Court stopped short of requiring an affirmative duty on prison officials to help inmates secure that access. (23)

         In another case that illustrated the right to meaningful access in the prison context, the Supreme Court indicated that in some situations, prison officials may have an affirmative duty to help inmates access the courts. (24) In Johnson v. Avery, the Court invalidated a prison regulation prohibiting prisoners from helping other prisoners prepare court papers. (25) The petitioner had helped other prisoners file petitions for writs of habeas corpus. (26) Referring to the importance of providing assistance to help illiterate prisoners draft petitions for habeas corpus, the Court observed, "it is fundamental that access of prisoners to the courts for the purpose of presenting their complaints may not be denied or obstructed." (27) Critical to the Court's holding was that the State had failed to provide...