Transcript  Plaintiffs (Boddie) brought a class action suit in the United States District Court for the District of Connecticut.  Asked court.

 Plaintiffs (Boddie) brought a class action suit in the United States
District Court for the District of Connecticut.
 Asked court to declare unconstitutional Connecticut statute
requiring fees and costs for service of process in divorce actions.
 Also requested an injunction that would allow plaintiffs, as well as
others in their class, to proceed without paying fees.
 District court denied both requests and dismissed the complaint for
failure to state a claim.
 Held that the legislature, not the court, should handle this
problem.
 Plaintiffs appealed directly to the Supreme Court of the United
States.
• Arthur LaFrance represented appellants while working for the New
Haven Legal Assistance Association.
The Center on Social Welfare Policy & Law, the National Housing Law Project and
Community Action for Legal Services, Inc. filed an amicus brief, as did the
National Legal Aid and Defender Association.
• Raymond Cannon represented appellees while serving as Assistant
Attorney General in Connecticut.
The following states filed an amicus brief in support of appellees: New Jersey,
Maryland, Delaware, Louisiana, Nebraska, Nevada, North Dakota & Oregon.
 Regulation of entry fees for the Connecticut Superior
Court is within the exclusive domain of the Connecticut
legislature.
 Courts cannot overturn legislation merely because it is
harsh, unwise, or they would have done it another way.
 The development of an in forma pauperis statute
necessarily requires the use of skills more appropriate to
the legislative function of government.
 Connecticut is experimenting with innovative concepts as it
develops in forma pauperis procedures.
 The court costs of a divorce proceeding in Connecticut are
a substantial barrier to litigation.
 Divorce proceedings are initiated by writ, summons and
complaint. Service fees vary ($15-$150) and the entry fee
costs $45. It costs a minimum of $60 to petition for divorce.
 These indigent appellants are barred from Connecticut
courts by their inability to pay court costs.
 Welfare funds do not include provision for legal fees.
 The state may not abdicate its responsibility in the hope
that charities will fill the void thus created.
 The prepayment of court entry fees required by
Connecticut general statutes is a constitutional exercise of
sovereign power.
 The entry fees are reasonably related to legitimate state
interests.
 The revenue generated is used to support the judicial system.
 Entry fees have the classical effect of reducing the amount of
frivolous litigation.
 The relief sought by appellants could properly have been
rendered by the court below.
 The fees generate revenue for the state.
 Filing fees constitute only one-tenth of the total revenue produced by
the judicial system.
 Allowing low-income people access to the court without paying a fee
does not significantly reduce the amount of money generated.
 The fees prevent frivolous litigation.
 Fees only prevent a low-income person from filing a lawsuit,
irrespective of its merits.
 It’s unclear whether fees actually deter frivolous lawsuits brought by
the wealthy.
 Other ways to prevent frivolous lawsuits:
 make abuse of the process a tort
 verifications under oath could be required in all actions, with contempt
punishments for false statements
 The Court should maintain the traditional concept that
civil litigants are responsible for the costs incidental to
bringing a legal action.
 Connecticut courts cannot waive payment of costs.
 One sues in forma pauperis as a matter of privilege.
 Connecticut’s requirement that these indigent appellants
pay court costs which they cannot afford is not a
permissible exercise of the police power.
 A classification based upon economic discrimination is
disfavored and must be both necessary and reasonably
related to the objectives sought.
 There is no necessity on rational basis for barring litigation
by the poor.
 Barring divorce actions has destructive consequences upon
the family units of the poor.
 The Griffin Doctrine should be limited to cases concerning the
personal liberty of an accused.
 There is no legal precedent to extend the Griffin Doctrine to civil
litigation.
 Divorce is not a right of sufficient magnitude to qualify for relief on the
extraordinary grounds of the Griffin Doctrine.
 The Griffin Doctrine is only justified in a criminal type proceeding
where the state is an actual participant having an adversary interest.
 Appellants claim that the relief in this case may be of a limited
nature.
 Only the State has kept appellants from its courts. The State,
through its agents, is the real appellee here. This is exactly
what Griffin involved.
 Appellees’ contention that a voluntary act precludes
constitutional safeguards hardly merits response.
 Criminals in this country, by a voluntary act of crime, surround
themselves with constitutional safeguards.
 Appellees apparently favor those who break the law over those
who keep it.
 The Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment only
protects rights that are constitutionally guaranteed.
 Divorce is not a constitutionally guaranteed right.
 Divorce can only be granted by statutory authority.
 Appellants were denied due process of laws when they
were denied the opportunity to petition for redress of
grievances.
 The 1st Amendment right to petition for redress of
grievances is incorporated by the Due Process Clause of the
14th Amendment.
 The right of a poor person to petition for redress of
grievances without payment of court costs is deeply rooted
in the common law which preceded the U.S. Constitution’s
guarantee of due process.
 Appellants are not denied equal protection.
 The Equal Protection Clause does not require a state to
finance any of the expenses of civil litigation incurred by
indigent parties.
 “In the area of economics and social welfare, a State does not violate the
Equal Protection Clause merely because the classifications made by its laws
are imperfect. If the classification has some ‘reasonable basis,’ it does not
offend the ‘Constitution simply because the classification ‘is not made with
mathematical nicety of because in practice it results in some inequality.’”
Lindsley v. Natural Carbonic Gas Co., 220 U.S. 61, 68.
 Appellants were denied equal protection of the laws
when they were denied access to the courts solely
because of their poverty.
 The Equal Protection Clause forbids economic
discrimination in the extension of significant rights.
 The rights of divorce, remarriage and procreation, all
involved here, are sufficiently significant to come within the
ambit of the Equal Protection Clause.
• Notes high level of importance placed
upon marriage in society
• Only way to divorce was through the court system; thus, the
state played a primary role and monopolized the means
through which a couple could divorce.
• A couple may agree to separate, but they cannot absolve themselves of
the legal obligations that attend to the marital relationship.
 The fee requirement, on its face, offends due process by
barring an individual’s right to be heard.
 Distinguishes Griffin
 While in Griffin the transcript could be waived as a
convenient but not necessary predicate to court access,
here the State invariably imposes the costs as a measure of
allocating its judicial resources.
Connecticut statute violated
indigent parties’ due process
and equal protection rights.
Brennan stated that the
majority opinion did not go
far enough when defining
the extent of due process
rights.
 Should have been decided
based on “the principles
developed in the line of cases
marked by Griffin v. Illinois.”
 Due Process Clause had
“proven very elastic in the
hands of judges.”
 Mentioned fishing licenses and
bond requirements to prevent
eviction, asked whether the
indigent might be excused from
paying those fees as well.
 The Equal Protection Clause, while not mathematically
precise, contains more definitive guidelines.
 Discrimination based on wealth should be prohibited
along the same lines as discrimination based on religion
or race.
 Marriage is entirely within
control of the states, and
by extension so is divorce.
 States possessed a unique
interest in marriage, and
the statute requiring fees
did not violate the Due
Process Clause or the
Equal Protection Clause.
 Black used textual argument to say that his fellow justices
cannot create new rights that are not in the Constitution.
 People have the sole power to amend the Constitution
through their legislature.
 Griffin pertains to criminal cases, not civil cases.
 Divorce is a private dispute that does not involve the
government as a party. It does not deny life, liberty or
property as opposed to criminal punishment.